Families of Ukrainian plane crash victims: Islamic Republic has made a mockery of international law
The Association of Families of the Victims of the Ukrainian Passenger Plane from Tehran to Toronto, which was shot down by a missile fired by the Revolutionary Guard, issued a statement rejecting the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization's emphasis on "human error" as the cause of the downing of the plane. Hamed Esmailiyon, the association's spokesman, also called on the media to refrain from using the description of an "accident" to describe the IRGC's shooting down of the passenger plane.
In the statement, the families of the victims referred to a recent report by the Civil Aviation Organization, stating that the report attempts to reduce the "complex and multi-layered issue" of the attack to the level of "human error" at the air defense site.
The statement, referring to the reasons cited by the Civil Aviation Organization for the IRGC's anti-aircraft system's error, including an error in installing the system that indicated a 107-degree difference in direction north, raises the question: If that were the case, why did this defense only target Flight PS 752 and not make a mistake with the other planes?
The statement, while raising other questions about the Civil Aviation Organization's report, states that this organization is a government entity and, because it is not independent, is not qualified to investigate this matter, as it has focused its attention on presenting the reasons put forward by the Islamic Republic regime.
The Tehran-Toronto Passenger Plane Victims' Association further stated regarding the latest report by the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization: "Creating a false narrative of "human error" and preparing this grossly flawed report is a continuation of making a mockery of all international laws and conventions."
Hamed Esmailiyon, a spokesman for the Association of Families of the Victims of Flight PS 752, who lost his wife and daughter in the disaster, took to Twitter on Saturday, July 19 to ask the media to refrain from describing the Revolutionary Guards' actions as "accidents."
At the same time, Reuters news agency reported, citing Islamic Republic officials, that the plane's black box was sent to France for examination after months.
On the morning of Wednesday, January 8, a Ukrainian Airlines Boeing 737 passenger plane with 176 people on board was shot down by the air defenses of the Revolutionary Guard Corps after taking off from an airport on the outskirts of Tehran. After days of insistence by Iranian officials that the plane had crashed due to a technical malfunction, the IRGC finally announced that it had mistakenly targeted the plane .
Hamed Esmailiyon says the Iranian government must be held accountable. The downed Ukrainian flight had 55 Canadian citizens on board .
Not long ago, the Canadian network CBC released an audio file that apparently shows that senior Iranian officials left Iranian skies open to commercial flights during a missile attack on a base hosting American forces in Iraq so that the missile attack plan on the Ain al-Assad base in Iraq would not be revealed.
Source: Voice of America
