Khamenei and the "mistake" of shooting down a passenger plane
Khamenei once said to the United States that it had mistakenly shot down a passenger plane: "You made a mistake, you made a mistake." Now the Revolutionary Guards under his command have admitted that they targeted the Ukrainian plane "by mistake."
Three days ago (Wednesday morning, January 8), a Ukrainian Airlines passenger plane crashed shortly after takeoff from Imam Khomeini Airport, killing all 176 people on board, most of whom were Iranian and Canadian citizens.
From the very first hours of the incident, news and rumors spread that the Ukrainian company's Boeing 737 was targeted by a defense system deployed in the region, which was vehemently denied by senior military and political officials of the Islamic Republic.
Shortly after the plane crashed, American media, citing sources from the US Department of Defense (Pentagon), reported that Iranian defense missiles had been detected by satellite and that they had probably accidentally hit the plane.
Reports were also published online, citing a video and images of the wreckage of the crashed plane, all of which indicated a high probability that the plane had been targeted, but Iranian political and military officials continued to deny the allegations and continue to contradict each other.
Denial and threats against journalists
Ali Abedzadeh, head of the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization, called the plane crash due to a missile hitting the defense system "impossible" in a television program, and Hesameddin Ashena, cultural advisor to President Hassan Rouhani, called the news in this regard "psychological warfare" and threatened Iranian journalists abroad not to fuel it.
These interactions have been met with much criticism both at home and abroad. Bahram Parsai, a Shiraz representative in the Islamic Consultative Assembly, wrote on Thursday evening, referring to the “hasty and unprofessional” statements made by some officials, that such interactions call into question the work of the accident investigators.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko tweeted on Friday, January 10, that the United States had provided Kyiv with “important information” about the downing of the Ukrainian plane.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also said a day after the incident that he had received information from various sources confirming that an Iranian defense missile had hit the Ukrainian airliner.
Pressure for transparency and prevention of secrecy
Meanwhile, senior officials from many countries, including Germany, Sweden, Canada, Britain, France, and Ukraine, called on the Islamic Republic to provide clarity on the cause of the Wednesday morning incident without concealment.
But this cover-up continued for three days after the Ukrainian airliner crashed, until finally, on the morning of Saturday, January 11, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran announced in a statement that "human error" by the Revolutionary Guards was the reason for the targeting and crash of the Ukrainian airliner.
Shortly thereafter, the Leader of the Islamic Republic, Ali Khamenei, as the Commander-in-Chief and the appointee of the head of this headquarters, and other commanders of the military and law enforcement forces, also reacted to the incident on Wednesday morning in a statement and offered condolences to the survivors of the victims.
In July 1991, on the third anniversary of a similar incident in which an Iranian passenger plane over the Persian Gulf was “mistakenly” targeted by a missile attack from a US warship, Khamenei made remarks that many social media users are now reposting on video.
"You made a mistake, you made a mistake"
In this speech, a portion of which was filmed and published on the "Historical Memory" Twitter page, Ali Khamenei addressed the Americans who had admitted their mistake in shooting down the Iranian plane and said: "You made a mistake, you made a mistake. What does it mean that we made a mistake?"
In his statement, the Leader of the Islamic Republic spoke of "proof of human error" in the downing of the Ukrainian passenger plane, but made no mention of the Revolutionary Guard forces who committed this "error."
Amir Ali Hajizadeh, commander of the Revolutionary Guards' Aerospace Force, took responsibility for the Wednesday morning incident in a television interview on Saturday, saying that the IRGC's air defense system had "mistakenly identified the Ukrainian passenger plane as a cruise missile" and fired at it.
Khamenei's information and his role in the three-day cover-up?
Hajizadeh was appointed to this position about ten years ago by order of Ali Khamenei. In his order dated November 4, 2009, Khamenei wrote to the new commander of the IRGC Aerospace Force: “You are expected to bring the readiness and combat capability of the force to the desired level by strictly observing the requirements and work regulations.”
The appointed official says he was informed on Wednesday morning that the Ukrainian plane had been targeted by a missile and reported the matter to higher authorities.
These higher ranks logically include the General Staff of the Armed Forces and its Commander-in-Chief, Khamenei. Hajizadeh attributed the public’s ignorance of the truth to the “quarantine” of informed individuals by the General Staff of the Armed Forces until the investigation into the accident is complete.
"Quarantine" is meant to prevent the outside world from spreading news. It is unbelievable that the General Staff has also restricted Ali Khamenei, as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.
Accordingly, Khamenei must have known long before that his subordinates had made a "mistake" in this matter, and perhaps the three-day cover-up was also on his own orders.
Source: DW
