Central Insurance of Iran: Damage to Ukrainian plane is not our concern

The head of the Central Insurance of Iran says that paying for the damages of the downed Ukrainian plane has nothing to do with Iranian companies, and that this is the responsibility of the European and Ukrainian reinsurance companies that covered Boeing.

In parallel with negotiations between Iran and Ukraine to pay compensation to the survivors of the victims of Flight 752, the head of the Central Insurance of Iran has emphasized that the damage to the plane has nothing to do with Iran.

Today, Monday, August 10, Gholamreza Soleimani told reporters in a virtual meeting: "This plane was covered by insurance companies in Ukraine and European reinsurance, and if any payment must be made in this regard, it must be by these companies."

Ten days earlier, however, Abbas Mousavi, spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, had said that the Islamic Republic held itself responsible for this "inadvertent act" and had agreed to pay compensation for the plane.

The head of the Central Insurance Agency of Iran had previously said in the first week of the plane downing: "Since the Ukrainian plane was insured by non-Iranian or Ukrainian companies and there must have been reinsurance, Ukrainian companies or other insurance companies should handle the issue of insuring its passengers and the plane itself. But since the plane crashed on Iranian soil and was a mistake by our air defenses, the government will hold negotiations with the Ukrainian government to pay compensation for the plane and passengers."

Tehran and Kiev talks

Five days ago, Iranian media reported a telephone conversation between the foreign ministers of the Islamic Republic and Ukraine, and Iran's announcement of its readiness to pay compensation to the families and relatives of the victims, and wrote that the Ukrainian delegation would travel to Tehran in October to continue negotiations.

The negotiations followed the reading of the black boxes of Flight 752, and were attended by representatives from Canada, Sweden, Afghanistan, and the United Kingdom.

The details of the preliminary negotiations between the parties are not clear, but Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kulba emphasized after the first round of talks with the Iranian delegation that the amount offered by Tehran was not satisfactory for the survivors and that Kiev was seeking to receive "the highest amount of compensation" from the Islamic Republic.

ISNA news agency on January 12, 2019, quoted the deputy head of the Central Insurance of Iran as saying: "Insurance coverage of 100,000 to 250,000 SDR is considered for each passenger, and this figure should be specified in the Ukrainian insurance policy, which is how much it was for the passengers of this plane... We predict that the damage will be about $24 million for passengers, crew, and cargo, and $70 million will be damage to the fuselage, which is at least $100 million in total. This figure may change and reach up to $150 million depending on the Ukrainian insurance policy."

The Association of Families of the Flight Victims has repeatedly stated that it considers any agreement on compensation to be invalid without a comprehensive, transparent, and impartial investigation into the downing of the passenger plane.

The association particularly emphasizes that the Islamic Republic does not have the authority to investigate this matter, because it is itself the perpetrator of the crime and an independent investigation conflicts with its interests: “… We have repeatedly reminded and explained that the “Air Accident Investigation Commission” in Iran is not an independent institution and does not have the authority to investigate this crime.”

During the Iranian delegation's negotiations with the Ukrainian side, Hamed Esmailiyon, a writer and dentist who lost his wife and 9-year-old son in the downing of Flight 752, wrote in a Facebook post: "They are going to set a price for our loved ones. No government has the right to reach an agreement with the Islamic Republic of Iran without our presence. None of us have talked about compensation and will not talk about it without conducting an investigation and administering justice. Instead of negotiating compensation, first clarify the purpose of this crime."

Immunity of disaster officials

The Tehran-Kiev flight was shot down by the Revolutionary Guards’ missile defense system minutes after takeoff in the early hours of January 8. All 176 passengers and crew on board, including 29 children, were killed. The Islamic Republic covered up the truth for three days and, after acknowledging it, called the incident “human error.”

Tehran's military prosecutor's office says three people, including the defense system operator, have been arrested in this connection. The families of the survivors, however, want the main perpetrators of the disaster to be identified, introduced, and punished, and the reason why Iran's skies remained clear on the night of the military operation to be clarified.

While a number of students and civil society activists have been arrested and sentenced to prison for protesting the IRGC’s cover-up of the downing of the plane, none of the missile defense officials or senior IRGC officials have been questioned or held accountable. Amirali Hajizadeh, the IRGC’s aerospace commander, has also been praised and acknowledged.

Survivors of the passengers say that the victims' valuables, gold, and documents have been looted and confiscated, and a number of families have also been subjected to security threats in response to their protests.

In the latest development, Touraj Dehghani Zanganeh, head of the Civil Aviation Organization, said that the black box data would be released in the coming days. He also called any “irrelevant use and political exploitation” of the accident investigation process “in conflict with the goals and principles of ICAO.”

This reference appears to be directed at the Association of Families of Flight 752 Survivors, which has launched an online campaign to collect signatures and, emphasizing the insecurity of Iranian skies, is urging European airlines to be cautious about resuming their flights in the air corridor to Iran.

Source: DW