Iranians pray for slain supreme leader Khamenei in son’s absence

Iranian leaders joined prayers Sunday over the casket of late supreme leader Ali Khamenei during a second day of funeral ceremonies, but his son and successor, Mojtaba Khamenei, was conspicuously absent.

The elder Khamenei ruled the Islamic republic from 1989 until he was killed aged 86 in an airstrike on the first day of the US-Israeli war with Iran on February 28.

Officials including President Masoud Pezeshkian and Revolutionary Guards chief Ahmad Vahidi joined Sunday’s ceremonies, along with huge crowds paying their final respects in Tehran.

But Mojtaba has not appeared in public since his appointment in early March. He is said to have been wounded in the attack that killed his father.

The late supreme leader’s other three sons, Masoud, Mostafa and Meysam, all attended the service.

It was held at Tehran’s Grand Mosalla religious complex and led by prominent Shia cleric Ja’far Sobhani, a 97-year-old scholar who teaches at seminaries in the holy city of Qom.

Sunday was declared a public holiday across Iran. Later in the day, Khamenei’s body will be moved out of the Grand Mosalla, where it is lying in state, as part of preparations for processions through the capital on Monday.

The vast complex and surrounding streets were packed with mourners on Sunday morning, AFP journalists saw.

With temperatures forecast to exceed 35C, many were handed refreshments as they made their way to the Grand Mosalla, some carrying Iranian flags or portraits of the late Khamenei.

Authorities have said they expect more than 10 million people to take part in the ceremonies in the capital.

Strict security measures have been imposed and official media have warned of a risk of crowd crushes.

“More than 4,000 people visited medical centres located in and near Tehran’s Mosalla,” Iran’s official IRNA news agency reported on Sunday, but no deaths had been recorded.

Footage from state television showed Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliament speaker and its chief negotiator in talks with the United States, attending the prayers.

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Also seen was Esmail Qaani, head of the Quds Force, the foreign arm of the Revolutionary Guards.

Khamenei’s coffin, draped in the Iranian flag and topped with his black turban, was placed alongside those of four relatives also killed in the February strikes, including an infant granddaughter.

‘Killers must face punishment’

After five weeks of intense fighting, the Middle East war is on hold following a ceasefire and an initial accord struck with the US. But both Washington and Tehran have warned they are ready to resume military action.

“The killers (of Khamenei) must face punishment,” a 38-year-old man surnamed Miremadi told AFP as he attended the prayers.

“If our leaders are about to proceed with negotiations in this manner, our people will not agree with it,” he said.

People were seeking revenge, not peace and negotiations, he added.

Khamenei’s funeral is being viewed outside Iran as a test of support for the government following mass protests in January that rights groups say were quelled by a crackdown that left thousands dead.

“We’re here to show the world that we back our revolution and our leader, and we demand revenge for the blood of our loved ones,” said one woman surnamed Bakand, a 39-year-old homemaker attending Sunday’s prayers.

Khamenei long pursued a course of confrontation with the West, and Tehran for years has provided support to anti-US and anti-Israel armed groups around the Middle East, including Palestinian Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.

Delegations from both those groups met with Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Saturday, Iranian state media reported, while representatives of Yemen’s Houthi rebels and Hamas ally Palestinian Islamic Jihad also attended the funeral ceremonies.

After the processions through Tehran on Monday, Khamenei’s coffin will be moved on Tuesday to Qom, then on Wednesday to neighbouring Iraq, before the burial on Thursday in his northeastern hometown of Mashhad.

AFP