what consequences for Iran and its foreign policy?

The ultraconservative leader was killed in a helicopter crash on Sunday. He was notably expected to succeed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the highest authority figure in the country.

Coming changes within Iranian power. After the death of President Ebrahim Raïssi and his head of diplomacy, made official on Monday May 20 after a helicopter crash that occurred the day before in the north of the country, Vice-President Mohammad Mokhber was designated as head of the executive. This is an interim appointment, while new elections are organized, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Monday. This election will take place on June 28, state television reported.

While national mourning has been declared for five days, several questions arise regarding the future of the country. After having been the architect of intense repression in recent years, will the ultraconservative Ebrahim Raïssi have a successor in his image?

The structure of power in Iran does not suggest a major political shift in one of the most repressive countries in the world. The President of the Republic is in fact not “than a Prime Minister (…), an executive”historian Jonathan Piron, a specialist in the country, explained on Monday on Franceinfo. “The real holder of power in Iran is not the President of the Republic, it is the guide of the Revolution”, he specifies. Since 1989, and the death of the first supreme guide, former president Ali Khamenei has held this position.

After periods of relative openness, notably from 2013 to 2021 during the presidency of Hassan Rouhani, considered moderate, the Iranian government has hardened its line and repressed numerous protest movements. The latest, the popular uprising in reaction to the death of student Mahsa Jina Amini in September 2022, was bloodily put down. The death of Ebrahim Raïssi should not, however, revive the protest, according to Jonathan Piron, because “the population is exhausted by the social and economic situation and by brutalization” authorities, he argues.

In the Iranian Parliament, the reformists are largely in the minority, with 20 seats against 227 for the conservatives, out of a total of 290. Neither Ayatollah Khamenei nor the deputies will therefore push for the nomination for a moderate president. “The system will communicate a lot on [la] dead [d’Ebrahim Raïssi] and will stick to constitutional procedures to show that it works, while looking for a new recruit who can maintain conservative unity and loyalty to Khamenei.”explains to the BBC Sanam Vakil, specialist in international relations, in charge of the Middle East and North Africa at the Chatham House think tank.

The Islamic Republic is also seeking a “new recruit” to ensure the ideological continuity of the regime. Aged 84, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is not only aging, he is also ill. For almost ten years, he has suffered from prostate cancer.

Due to this medical assessment, the name of Ebrahim Raïssi had been circulating for several years as a possible successor to the supreme guide of the revolution. “Like Khamenei himself when he became supreme leader, [Ebrahim Raïssi] was relatively young, loyal, an ideologue committed to the system and whose name was recognized”, recalls Sanam Vakil to the BBC.

The death of the president on Sunday revives speculation around this succession, which is already an opaque process. “The game is decided behind the scenes and in particular among the most radical, close to the current guide and the body of the Guardians of the Revolution”this paramilitary organization which has taken over large parts of the Iranian economy, explains Jonathan Piron.

In this climate of uncertainty, Ayatollah Khamenei is reassuring. Sunday, the supreme leader declared on the social network “the Iranian people [devait] don’t worry” and that there would be “no disturbance in the affairs of the country”. A message published even before the death of Ebrahim Raïssi was officially confirmed.

With the death of President Raïssi and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, Iran suddenly lost two important figures in its diplomacy. Since his election in 2021, Ebrahim Raïssi has tried to take up a particular challenge on the international scene: relaunch the nuclear agreement, in order to convince the United States to lift the embargo which has undermined the Iranian economy since May 2018.

This project should be, at least for the coming weeks, taken up by the new interim Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ali Bagheri, who is none other than the former chief negotiator of the Iranian nuclear issue. In the hours following his appointment on Monday, this seasoned 56-year-old diplomat held a first council with his deputy ministers, while Russia expressed in a press release its desire to “strengthen cooperation” between the two countries.

In a telephone interview the same day, he also called for “global and uninterrupted cooperation” with China, another strategic partner of Iran, according to the official Irna agency. Despite his supposed proximity to Ayatollah Khamenei, Ali Bagheri is not unanimous among conservatives, certain fringes of whom refuse dialogue with the West regarding nuclear power. His retention in this position is therefore not completely guaranteed.

For Farid Vahid, political scientist, Iran expert at the Jean Jaurès Foundation interviewed by AFP, “Iran will only radically change its foreign policy (…) through a change of regime.” The choice of the president and the head of diplomacy would therefore only be a question of “shades”and no major developments are expected “as long as the Guide is alive and the Guardians [de la révolution] are there”he believes.