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Iran
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (left) endorsed the presidency of Ebrahim Raisi (right) in a ceremony in Tehran on August 3, 2021. Photo: handout/Iran presidency
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Representatives from dozens of countries, including neighbouring Iraq and a special delegation from the European Union, are arriving in Tehran to attend the inauguration of Iran’s new president, Ebrahim Raisi, on Thursday.
Raisi, whose presidency was endorsed by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a ceremony on Tuesday, will take the oath of office in parliament Thursday afternoon.
A Kurdish delegation led by Kurdistan Region President Nechirvan Barzani is attending. He is accompanied by his chief-of-staff, the Minister of Endowment and Religious Affairs, Minister of Culture and Youth, and Minister of Labor and Social Affairs.
The Iraqi delegation led by President Barham Salih arrived in Tehran on Thursday morning, Iraqi state media reported. He is accompanied by chairman of the Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council Faeq Zidan and several parliamentarians.
Salih and Raisi had a meeting in which the Iraqi leader "stressed the need for mutual understanding and cooperative efforts through constructive dialogue to establish regional stability and confront mutual challenges in the region such as facing terrorism and health crises," read a statement from his office. He said he would also like to see cooperation in tackling the climate crisis.
Salih said that a stable and safe sovereign Iraq is essential to the stability of the Middle East.
A European Union delegation led by Enrique Mora, deputy secretary-general of the European External Action Service (EEAS) arrived in Iran a day early and met with Iran’s outgoing foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his deputy Abbas Araghchi. They discussed Vienna talks to revive the nuclear deal, negotiations that Mora is chairing.
The EU’s ambassador to Vienna Stephan Klement and the head of EU’s Iran task force Bruno Scholl are accompanying Mora to Tehran.
The European Union said the presence at Raisi’s swearing-in is “crucial” to establish diplomatic relations.
“It is crucial to engage diplomatically with the new administration and to pass directly important messages,” spokesperson Nabila Massrali said on Tuesday.
Israel attacked the EU’s attendance in Tehran.
“The decision of the European Union to send a senior representative to the swearing-in ceremony of the "Butcher of Tehran" is puzzling and shows poor judgment,” spokesperson for the Israeli foreign ministry Lior Haiat tweeted on Monday.
“Flattery and subservience to violent and totalitarian regimes only encourages further violence and aggression,” he added. “We strongly recommend the EU to immediately cancel their shameful participation in the inauguration ceremony of the butcher of Tehran.”
Raisi is accused of sitting on a “death committee” that oversaw mass prison executions in 1988. His involvement in the massacre may come to light in a trial that will begin next week in Sweden.
Just hours ahead of Raisi's swearing-in, Amnesty International announced Iranian authorities had "secretly executed a young man who was a child at the time of his arrest and had spent nearly a decade on death row."
"Sajad Sanjari was hanged in Dizelabad prison, but his family weren't told until a prison official asked them to collect his body," Amnesty stated. It is not immediately clear when the execution took place.
Human rights monitors have expressed concern about a possible erosion of rights in Iran under Raisi's tenure, given his record.
Raisi has met with several foreign delegations arriving in the Iranian capital, including Venezuela, Pakistan, Bolivia, Ghana, Yemen, and Syria.
The deputy secretary-general of Hezbollah, Naim Qasim, is also in Tehran for the ceremony.
Raisi won the Iranian presidential elections in June by a huge margin, leading his nearest rival by 14.5 million votes. The election saw a historically low turnout with only 28 million ballots cast of Iran’s potential 60 million voters.
The 60-year-old ultraconservative former chief justice is considered to be close to Khamenei.
Updated at 11:52 am
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