In a background where the country’s official media has reported that no one is ‘thinkable to be alive’ from the helicopter crash in which the Iranian President Ibrahim Raisi and the country’s Minister of Foreign Affairs were traveling, we get to know the information about the ‘helicopter travel fear or self-censorship’ that the President had when he visited the country recently.
The President of Iran, Mr. Ibrahim Raisi, came to this country on the 24th to inaugurate the Uma Oya Multipurpose Development Project. On that day, the plane on which the Iranian President arrived landed at Mattala Airport.
The first plan was to take the Iranian president from Mattala to the Uma Oya event ground by helicopter. This was because according to the travel schedule of the Iranian President in this country, the Iranian side had only 20 minutes to travel from Mattala to the Uma Oya site.
Even though the security forces of this country confirmed that it is not possible to travel by road from Mattala to the Uma Oya site in such a short period of time, the Iranian president strongly rejected this ‘helicopter journey’.
Due to this situation, the security forces of this country had to take the delegation including the Iranian President from Mattala to the Uma Oya site on road.
Although several rehearsals were conducted in this regard, it was confirmed that it was not possible to take him to the Uma Oya site in less than an hour.
But the assessment of the Iranian guards who came to this country to look into the security of the Iranian President was that it would be possible to travel from Mattala in 20 minutes.
Even though our security forces know that it is not possible, they agree with the statement of the Iranian guards because a disagreement could have hindered the Iranian president’s visit to this country.
After the arrival of the President of Iran at Mattala, the road will be completely closed to normal traffic, but the road will be closed to all pedestrians, with the expectation of taking the President to the event site at the target time.
However, in the end, the President had spent an hour traveling from Mattala to the Uma Oya site.
At the end of the ceremony, there was a plan to take him to the hotel in Colombo where he was staying by helicopter, but that too was rejected by the Iranian president.
Therefore, the Iranian President, who came again via the Mattala highway, was brought to Colombo by using the plane he arrived from Mattala to Katunayake.
The President was brought to the hotel where he was staying that night from Katunayake via the expressway. After completing his visit to the country, he was traveling back to Katunayake via the expressway.
The Iranian President visited this country after a visit to Pakistan. He stayed in Pakistan for a few days but it was reported that he didn’t travel using the helicopters there either.
However, during his recent trip abroad, including in this country, the Iranian president who has strictly refused helicopter travel, has met with an accident during a helicopter trip in the north-western region of Azerbaijan.
9 people including the President of Iran and its Foreign Minister had joined this helicopter trip.
Although they could not be found by other planes due to the bad weather with heavy fog, the Iranian media is currently reporting that this helicopter is in danger ‘to the extent that it is impossible to think that anyone has survived’.
Analysts are of the opinion that this event will bring a bit of a shock to Iran as well as the world in view of the current political situation.
