Iran International
One hundred days after former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was killed in an attack on his office in Tehran, the Islamic Republic has yet to bury the man who led the country for more than three decades.
The delay has become one of the most unusual and politically sensitive aspects of Iran's post-war transition. While senior military commanders and officials killed in the same conflict have already been buried, repeated promises of a massive funeral for Khamenei have so far gone unfulfilled.
Tehran municipal officials spoke of plans for a multi-day funeral procession later this month. Ceremonies, they said, are expected to span several cities before Khamenei's final burial in the religious city of Mashhad.
The prolonged delay sits awkwardly alongside Shi'ite religious tradition, which generally favors the prompt burial of the dead. Classical jurisprudence encourages hastening burial except in exceptional circumstances, such as uncertainty over death or concerns about preserving life. Several contemporary clerics have similarly argued that unnecessary delays should be avoided if they risk disrespecting the deceased.
The absence of a funeral has fueled speculation about the condition of Khamenei's remains following the strike that killed him. Iranian media reports about other officials who died in the same attack described bodies recovered weeks later and identified only through DNA testing after suffering extensive damage.
Officials have released no information about the condition or location of Khamenei's remains.
Security concerns and a missing successor
The unanswered questions surrounding the burial have merged with another mystery: the continued absence of Khamenei's successor.
Mojtaba Khamenei, who assumed leadership following his father's death, has not appeared publicly since the attack. Officials insist he survived and suffered only minor injuries, but reports and rumors about more serious wounds have persisted.
If alive and active, Mojtaba Khamenei would rank among Israel's most prominent targets. Any large public appearance could present significant security risks.
That reality complicates what would ordinarily be a defining moment for a new leader. A funeral for a supreme leader is not merely a religious ceremony; it is also a display of political continuity. The absence of the successor from such an event would be difficult to explain, while his appearance could expose him to risks the authorities may be unwilling to accept.
The politics of a funeral
There is also a political dimension to the delay. The Islamic Republic has a long history of using such ceremonies for political messaging. An example was the funeral of Qassem Soleimani, the former commander of the Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force.
The funeral procession, held for several days, passed through Kadhimiya, Baghdad, Najaf, Karbala, Ahvaz, Mashhad, Tehran and Qom before Soleimani was ultimately buried in Kerman.
State media and Iranian officials said millions of people attended the ceremonies and repeatedly used images from the events in official messaging.
The publicity surrounding the funeral largely overlooked the deaths of 56 mourners, who were killed in a stampede during the burial ceremony in Kerman.
Officials have shown they hope for a similarly turnout for Khamenei. Yet organizing a funeral on that scale in the aftermath of war presents obvious logistical and security challenges.
For now, the result is an unusual limbo. One hundred days after Khamenei's death, Iran has formally selected a successor but has yet to publicly introduce him. It has promised a historic farewell for its former leader but has yet to hold one. And it continues to confront questions that neither official statements nor public ceremonies have managed to answer.
"The shortage of opium tincture has become one of the most serious challenges facing addiction treatment centers," Saeed Safatian, a former treatment director at Iran's Drug Control Headquarters, told ILNA.
Supplies of opium tincture, one of the three main medicines used in Iran's addiction treatment system alongside methadone and buprenorphine, have fallen sharply in recent months.
Safatian linked the shortages to reduced availability of raw opium following the Taliban's ban on poppy cultivation in Afghanistan and said authorities had failed to prepare adequately despite years of warnings about potential supply disruptions.
Proposals to cultivate opium domestically for pharmaceutical purposes and efforts to secure imports from countries including India and Turkey failed to materialize, leaving treatment providers with few options, according to Safatian.
The shortages have fueled concerns among addiction specialists that patients unable to obtain prescribed medicines could return to the illicit drug market.
"Nearly one million patients depend on maintenance treatment with opium tincture across the country, but treatment centers in more than 15 provinces have faced shortages or suspension of their medicine allocations," Ali Ahmadi, deputy head of Tehran province's addiction treatment providers association, said earlier during a protest by treatment providers outside the Health Ministry.
A worker at an addiction treatment center told Iran International in January that he had received no support from the State Welfare Organization despite a decade of operating a treatment facility. The revocation of licenses for some centers had also pushed many patients toward methadone treatment, he said.
The effects of the shortages became apparent in 2023 and intensified in 2025, when some treatment centers were able to provide opium tincture to only a fraction of patients seeking it, Safatian said.
He warned that some users could shift to methamphetamine or combine multiple substances, making treatment more difficult and increasing health, social and economic harms.
Shortages of opium tincture, methadone and other addiction medicines, he said, could continue in the coming months if problems securing raw materials and foreign currency persist, adding to pressure on Iran's addiction treatment system.
According to the information obtained by Iran International, the order to keep Paydari supporters away from the gatherings was issued after requests by President Masoud Pezeshkian and Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who also heads Tehran’s negotiating team.
Protesters carrying placards opposing concessions on the nuclear issue have also been removed from the state-backed rallies, according to the same information.
The move points to an effort by senior figures in the Islamic Republic to contain ultra-hardline pressure at a sensitive moment, as Tehran and Washington continue talks over a possible understanding involving the ceasefire, the Strait of Hormuz, frozen Iranian assets and nuclear-related terms.
The Paydari Front and its allies have been among the most vocal opponents of negotiations with the United States. In recent days, figures close to the camp have criticized Ghalibaf and the negotiating team, warning against concessions and arguing that talks with Washington amount to a mistake.
The reported removals came as the Islamic Republic held the first anniversary ceremony for Ruhollah Khomeini since the killing of Ali Khamenei, without the former supreme leader’s presence.
During the ceremony on Thursday, Mojtaba Khamenei issued a message warning against what he called doubt, despair, fear and suspicion.
The message, read by Mohammad-Javad Haj-Ali-Akbari, Tehran’s interim Friday prayer leader, said any action that causes public pessimism or disillusionment amounts to helping the enemy.
Accounts from several provinces described children and teenagers taking part in checkpoint operations and handling weapons at state-sponsored gatherings, despite international conventions that call on governments to keep minors away from military and security activities.
“Recession, inflation, poverty and hardship are rampant, and this is a sign of economic collapse,” a resident of Fereydunkenar, north of Iran, said. “They have set up checkpoints with children aged 10 to 12 and gather people around city squares with food and payments to show strength.”
A resident of Tehran province described what he said was the growing presence of minors at checkpoints in Shahriar, near Tehran.
“Almost all the checkpoints in Shahriar are run by children under 16 holding flashlights. It is truly absurd,” the resident wrote.
Military training at public gatherings
Citizens also described state-organized events where children were given access to firearms and military training activities.
A resident of Tehran said children had been deployed at checkpoints during public events and that authorities had also set up stations distributing tea and refreshments.
Similar accounts emerged from other parts of the country.
“At the entrance to Bastak in Hormozgan province, they hand rifles to children every night,” one resident said.
Another citizen from Kelardasht in Mazandaran province reported seeing children being taught how to handle weapons.
Long history of youth mobilization
The use of minors in military and security-related activities has a long history in the Islamic Republic.
During the Iran-Iraq War, thousands of teenagers were sent to the front lines, and many were killed in military operations. In the decades that followed, military-oriented instruction continued through school programs such as “Defensive Readiness” classes and student Basij activities.
Student Basij organizations and university Basij branches have for years operated within educational institutions, recruiting young people into structures linked to the security establishment.
Human rights advocates argue that linking formal education with military and paramilitary activities risks normalizing violence and militarization among children and adolescents.
Iran is a party to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which requires states to protect children from involvement in military activities and provide a safe environment for their development and education.
Expansion of military imagery
The reports coincide with a broader increase in the public display of military equipment across Iran.
In recent months, images have circulated showing missiles, military hardware, Revolutionary Guards speedboats and light and heavy weapons displayed in public spaces, schools, state-organized gatherings and media programs.
Child rights advocates view such measures as part of a wider effort to normalize the presence of weapons in children's daily lives and to militarize public space.
The growing involvement of children and teenagers in government-organized activities, checkpoints and military programs may also reflect efforts to cultivate future generations of ideologically aligned supporters and security personnel, according to critics of the policy.
