WATCH: Iran Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei sobs during funeral prayer for Qasim Soleimani
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei weeps while he leads a prayer on the coffin of killed Iranian general Qasim Soleimani, Tehran, Iran, Jan. 6, 2020. (Photo: Kurdistan 24)
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei led a prayer on Monday for killed Iranian general Qasim Soleimani in a ceremony dozens of Iranian officials attended.
The procession took place at Tehran University, where Khamenei wept as he read a prayer for the deceased Soleimani, who was killed in a US attack last week.
Other senior officials in the Iranian government, including President Hassan Rouhani, as well as military commanders, attended the ceremony.
A US drone strike last week on a convoy near the Baghdad airport killed Soleimani, long-time head of the Quds Force, the paramilitary arm of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard.
The strike also killed Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the head of the Iranian-backed Shia militia, Kata’ib Hizbollah, which was responsible for killing a US contractor on Dec. 27 in a rocket attack on an Iraqi military base near Kirkuk.
Read More: US strike kills Qasim Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis
Iran has vowed to respond to the attack and declared on Sunday that it would no longer abide by a 2015 nuclear accord it signed with world powers.
Elsewhere, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) said it would convene in Brussels on Monday to discuss ongoing developments in the Middle East, including the escalation of US-Iran tensions.