<div style="text-align: justify; "><span style="font-size: 1rem;"><b>A helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi has suffered a “hard landing”, state television reported, as officials said search operations are under way.</b></span><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Iranian state media said the incident occurred on Sunday near Jolfa in Iran’s East Azerbaijan province.</div><div style="text-align: justify; "><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">A day earlier, Raisi was in neighbouring Azerbaijan to inaugurate a dam alongside President Ilham Aliyev.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">State-linked media said three helicopters were in the Iranian president’s convoy, and the two others made it back safely.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, East Azerbaijan Governor Malek Rahmati, and Ayatollah Mohammad Ali Ale-Hashem, the representative of the Iranian supreme leader to the province, were in the same helicopter as Raisi, state media reported.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Energy Minister Ali Akbar Mehrabian and Housing and Transportation Minister Mehrdad Bazrpash were in the other helicopters that made it back safely.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">People who were with the president inside the helicopter managed to make an emergency call, according to the semiofficial Tasnim News Agency.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Tasnim reported that the call increased hopes that the incident can be concluded “without fatalities”.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">It remains unclear exactly what caused the “hard landing”, or whether any of the passengers in the helicopter have been hurt. - Al Jazeera&nbsp;</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd/fas</div>