Revelations About IRGC Missile Attack on Ukrainian Plane
It is reported that Hossein Salamis, Commander of the IRGC, met with the families of two victims of the Ukrainian passenger plane crash. During this meeting, Salami claimed that if the Ukrainian plane had not been shot down, the United States would have attacked Iran.
The newspaper “Shargh” published the text of interviews with Zahra Majd and Mohsen Asadi-Lari, parents of two of the victims of the IRGC air defense attack on Ukrainian Airlines flight PS 752. The interview became the newspaper’s most-viewed report.
Mohsen Asadi-Lari was previously the Director General of International Affairs at the Ministry of Health of the Islamic Republic before his dismissal. He and his wife, Zahra Majd, lost their two children, aged 23 and 21, in this missile attack.
In this interview, they announced that they had filed complaints against Ali Shamkhani, Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of the Islamic Republic; Hossein Salami, Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps; and Amir Ali Hajizadeh, Commander of the IRGC Air Force. A complaint written in ten pages, which they themselves have little hope will lead to results in the proceedings of this case.
Human Shield
Asadi-Lari said in this interview that they had not believed the plane crash story from the very beginning. The initial cover-up by the IRGC and officials of the Islamic Republic regarding the IRGC’s missile attack on the passenger plane resulted in several “stages of mourning” for them.
The first stage of this mourning was hearing the news of the death of their two children. However, the next stage, which Asadi-Lari refers to as a “catastrophe,” was the confirmation of the news of the IRGC’s missile attack by Hajizadeh, Commander of the IRGC Air Force.
Mohsen Asadi-Lari had announced in an interview he previously conducted with “Ensaf News” that the IRGC had used the aforementioned passenger plane as a human shield.
He and his wife, Zahra Majd, said in their interview that after the news of the IRGC’s missile attack was published, several officials from the Rouhani government, including Ishaq Jahangiri, Vice President, visited them.
Meeting with IRGC Commander
Their most important meeting, however, was with Hossein Salami, Commander of the IRGC. Asadi-Lari says that in the days before the forty-day commemoration ceremony of their children, Hossein Salami came to visit them by having one of their family members as an intermediary.
The IRGC Commander insisted that this meeting be “secret” and said that this meeting should be “very secret and we didn’t tell anyone and we tried not to spread any photos or anything.”
Hossein Salami said to the parents of Mohammad Hossein and Zainab Asadi-Lari, two of the victims of the IRGC missile attack, during this meeting: “If this incident [the IRGC’s missile attack on the Ukrainian plane] had not happened, 10 million people would have been killed, and this event prevented this war from occurring.”
Asadi-Lari and his wife emphasized in this interview that “the real culprits are others. They are presenting 10 defendants in court who have not even been identified.”
In another section of this interview, it is stated that a person referred to as an operator in this case is not actually an operator but a squadron commander.
Furthermore, it is stated that not only have the main defendants not been identified, but regarding the Commander of the IRGC Air Force, who is said to have been informed of the charges, a non-prosecution order has been issued.
Asadi-Lari and Zahra Majd said in their interview that they do not trust the media of the Islamic Republic and state television. They emphasized that they will continue to pursue their complaints against Shamkhani, Salami, and Hajizadeh.
Source: DW
