{"id":42230,"date":"2020-01-11T11:22:23","date_gmt":"2020-01-11T11:22:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=42230"},"modified":"2020-01-11T11:22:23","modified_gmt":"2020-01-11T11:22:23","slug":"iran-says-it-unintentionally-shot-down-ukrainian-jetliner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=42230","title":{"rendered":"Iran says it \u2018unintentionally\u2019 shot down Ukrainian jetliner"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nTEHRAN: Iran announced Saturday that its military \u201cunintentionally\u201d shot down the Ukrainian jetliner <\/a>that crashed earlier this week, killing all 176 aboard, after the government had repeatedly denied Western accusations that it was responsible.<\/p>\n

\nThe plane was shot down early Wednesday, hours after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack on two military bases housing US troops in Iraq in retaliation for the killing of Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani in an American airstrike in Baghdad. No one was wounded in the attack on the bases.<\/p>\n

\nA military statement carried by state media said the plane was mistaken for a \u201chostile target\u201d after it turned toward a \u201csensitive military center\u201d of the Revolutionary Guard. The military was at its \u201chighest level of readiness,\u201d it said, amid the heightened tensions with the United States.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cIn such a condition, because of human error and in a unintentional way, the flight was hit,\u201d the military said. It apologized and said it would upgrade its systems to prevent future tragedies.<\/p>\n

\nIt also said those responsible for the strike on the plane would be prosecuted.<\/p>\n

\nUkrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky demanded Saturday that Iran punish those responsible for the downing of a Ukrainian airliner and pay compensation.
\u201cWe expect Iran… to bring the guilty to the courts,\u201d the Ukrainian leader wrote on Facebook, calling also for the \u201cpayment of compensation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nZelensky is set to hold a telephone call with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\nHe has scheduled a \u201ctelephone conversation with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani for five pm (1500 GMT) on Saturday,\u201d the presidential press office said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\nUkraine\u2019s prime minister says Iran’s admission that it shot down the Ukrainian passenger jet isn\u2019t the end of investigating the catastrophe.
The admission \u201cis an important step in the investigation process, which is still ongoing,\u201d Oleksiy Honcharuk said in a Facebook post on Saturday. \u201cOur experts are continuing to work at the scene of the tragedy with the aim of a detailed investigation of the causes and the final establishment of the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nThe head of the Ukrainian airline Evgeniy says he was sure all along that that the company was not at fault.
\u201cWe did not for a second doubt that our crew and our plane could not have been the cause of this terrible, awful air catastrophe,\u201d he said on Facebook. \u201cThey were our best guys and girls. The best.\u201d<\/p>\n

\nIran\u2019s acknowledgement of responsibility for the crash was likely to inflame public sentiment against authorities after Iranians had rallied around their leaders in the wake of Soleimani\u2019s killing. The general was seen as a national icon, and hundreds of thousands of Iranians had turned out for funeral processions across the country.<\/p>\n

\nBut the majority of the plane crash victims were Iranians or Iranian-Canadians, and the crash came just weeks after authorities quashed nationwide protests ignited by a hike in gasoline prices.<\/p>\n

\nIran\u2019s President Hassan Rouhani blamed the tragedy on \u201cthreats and bullying\u201d by the United States after the killing of Soleimani. He expressed condolences to families of the victims, and he called for a \u201cfull investigation\u201d and the prosecution of those responsible.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cA sad day,\u201d Iran\u2019s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted. \u201cHuman error at time of crisis caused by US adventurism led to disaster. Our profound regrets, apologies and condolences to our people, to the families of all victims, and to other affected nations.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

\nA sad day. Preliminary conclusions of internal investigation by Armed Forces:<\/p>\n

Human error at time of crisis caused by US adventurism led to disaster<\/p>\n

Our profound regrets, apologies and condolences to our people, to the families of all victims, and to other affected nations.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Javad Zarif (@JZarif) January 11, 2020<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\nThe jetliner, a Boeing 737 operated by Ukrainian International Airlines, went down on the outskirts of Tehran shortly after taking off from Imam Khomeini International Airport.<\/p>\n

\nIran had denied for several days that a missile caused the crash. But then the US and Canada, citing intelligence, said they believed Iran shot down the aircraft with a surface-to-air missile, a conclusion supported by videos of the incident.<\/p>\n

\nThe plane, en route to the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, was carrying 167 passengers and nine crew members from several countries, including 82 Iranians, at least 57 Canadians and 11 Ukrainians, according to officials. The Canadian government had earlier lowered the nation\u2019s death toll from 63.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cThis is the right step for the Iranian government to admit responsibility, and it gives people a step toward closure with this admission,\u201d said Payman Parseyan, a prominent Iranian-Canadian in western Canada who lost a number of friends in the crash.<\/p>\n

\n\u201cI think the investigation would have disclosed it whether they admitted it or not. This will give them an opportunity to save face.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TEHRAN: Iran announced Saturday that its military \u201cunintentionally\u201d shot down the Ukrainian jetliner that crashed earlier this week, killing all 176 aboard, after the government had repeatedly denied Western accusations that it was responsible. The plane was shot down early Wednesday, hours after Iran launched a ballistic missile attack on two military bases housing US…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":42231,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=42230"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42230\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/42231"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=42230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=42230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=42230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}