Ukrainian Foreign Ministry: We have not received Iran's final report on Flight 752
Iran has repeatedly said that it has delivered a report on the downing of Ukrainian airliner Flight 752, but Ukraine's deputy foreign minister says that his country has not received any documents from Iran.
The Islamic Republic has said several times that it has finalized the technical report on the downing of Ukrainian airliner Flight 752 and sent it to Ukrainian authorities; however, Ukraine's Deputy Foreign Minister has said that his country has not yet received any documents from Iran.
"We have heard several times from Iranian officials that the report has been finalized and its translation is in the final stages," Ukrainian Deputy Foreign Minister Yevgeny Yenin said in an interview with the local Hromadsk radio station, quoted by the Ukrainian News Agency. "I have been hearing this almost every week in recent months, but we have not received any documents. According to the Chicago Convention, Iran is obliged to submit a semi-final report if the technical investigations are not completed within a year after the disaster."
He added that the final report on the aforementioned technical investigation is absolutely necessary for both legal investigations and for identifying those responsible, determining compensation, and other issues.
The Deputy Foreign Minister of Ukraine emphasized: "We are impatiently awaiting the receipt of the technical investigation report. Only after receiving this report can we comment on the real causes of the disaster. I can only assure that Ukraine will rely on an objective and impartial investigation. We have repeatedly emphasized to the Iranian side that no attempts to lure or distract us will work."
The news continues that, according to Islamic Republic media reports, the Iranian Civil Aviation Organization has prepared a report on the technical investigation into the downing of Flight 752 and made it available to the relevant countries in a video conference on Monday (December 21).
The Public Relations Department of the Civil Aviation Organization of Iran officially announced on Wednesday, January 23 (December 23), that a video conference meeting was held on January 1 between the Civil Aviation Organization's accident investigation team and representatives of the countries involved in the accident.
According to the report, in addition to Canada, Sweden, Britain, and Germany, whose nationals were on the plane, the United States, as the designer and manufacturer of the plane, Ukraine, as the country of registration and operation of the plane, France, as the country that provided technical assistance for examining the black box, and representatives of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) were also present at the meeting.
According to Iranian media reports, in accordance with ICAO standards, a draft accident investigation report will be sent to the countries that participated in the investigation. Iran has given the various countries two months to express their opinions before the final report is published.
An ambiguous disaster
In about two weeks, on January 8, it will be one year since the downing of a Ukrainian airliner by IRGC missiles near Tehran's Imam Khomeini Airport. 176 people lost their lives in the incident, most of them Canadian citizens.
The Islamic Republic, which denied firing on the plane for the first three days after the accident, finally said after releasing evidence and reports that a missile had hit it that the Revolutionary Guards had mistaken the plane for a cruise missile and fired at it.
Iran did not cancel passenger flights, despite placing the Revolutionary Guard Corps on full alert at the time, a move some have described as providing a “human shield” to prevent a possible US retaliatory attack.
Families of many of the victims, as well as Canadian and Ukrainian officials, say they doubt Iran will provide an honest account of the true extent of the incident.
After reviewing the black box, Iranian aviation officials claimed that only 19 seconds of conversation between the three pilots was recorded after the first missile hit, and that no sound was recorded from the cockpit after the second missile hit due to "significant damage."
Canada, which is not satisfied with the investigation process, says it will take the case to the International Court of Justice in The Hague if the families of the victims are not satisfied with the final report.
In turn, Iranian officials accuse the Canadian government of politically exploiting the situation and attempting to portray the shooting down of the plane as "deliberate."
On Monday, January 21, the Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman responded to Canadian Foreign Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne's statements that "human error" in the downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane in early January of this year was unbelievable.
According to ISNA news agency, Saeed Khatibzadeh called the Canadian Foreign Minister's statements "unacceptable" and said: "Canadian officials have made the most unnecessary interventions in this matter from day one, and they tried to prevent the natural path of clarification from happening. Their behavior is completely political and illegal, and they are trying to create an atmosphere with these statements."
