Zelensky calls for admission of guilt, justice after Iran admits to mistakenly shooting down Ukrainian plane

The air disaster occurred early Wednesday, just hours after Iran fired more than a dozen short-range ballistic missiles at military bases housing American troops in Iraq — retaliation for a U.S. drone strike that killed a top Iranian commander, Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani, in Baghdad last week.

Iran’s military was on high alert at the time, the General Staff of the Armed Forces said in a statement early Saturday. It said that the Boeing 737-800, en route to Kyiv, had turned toward a “sensitive military site” belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, at an altitude that made it appear to be a hostile aircraft, when it was unintentionally shot down.

“This morning was not good, but it brought the truth,” Zelensky said on Facebook.

“We expect from Iran assurances of readiness for a full and open investigation, bringing the perpetrators to justice, returning the bodies of the dead, payment of compensations, official apologies through diplomatic channels,” he said. “We hope that the investigation will continue in the future without artificial delays and obstacles.”

Iranian authorities had initially denied that the airliner was shot down, dismissing statements from Western officials, who in turned cited intelligence reports, as part of a U.S.-led “psychological operation.”

In a televised news conference Friday, the head of Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization had said that he was “certain” the plane was not hit by a missile and instead had suffered a technical malfunction.

The director of Ukraine International Airlines, Evgeny Dykhne, wrote on Facebook Saturday: “We didn’t doubt for one second that our crew and our plane could cause this terrible plane crash.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, in a statement posted to his website, vowed to investigate and prosecute those responsible for “this unforgivable mistake.”

“This painful accident is not something that can be easily overlooked,” he said. “Further investigation is needed to identify all the causes and roots of this tragedy and prosecute the perpetrators of this unforgivable mistake.”

“It is also necessary to adopt the required arrangements and measures to address the weaknesses of the country's defense systems to make sure such a disaster is never repeated,” he said.

Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, wrote on Twitter that “human error at time of crisis caused by US adventurism led to disaster.”

Soleimani’s killing indeed sent regional tensions soaring and Iran portrayed its missile attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq as a “legitimate response.” But now Iran’s government is facing tough questions over the crash, which killed 82 Iranian passengers and many more who were dual nationals.

Fifty-seven of the passengers were Canadian and 138 were traveling to Toronto.

“Our focus remains closure, accountability, transparency, and justice for the families and loved ones of the victims,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a statement. “This is a national tragedy, and all Canadians are mourning together. We will continue working with our partners around the world to ensure a complete and thorough investigation, and the Canadian government expects full cooperation from Iranian authorities.”

For Ukraine, Iran’s admission offered a piece of closure it never received from Russia after the July 2014 downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17. That passenger airliner was downed by a missile shot from a Russian-made Buk surface-to-air missile system from rebel territory in eastern Ukraine. The attack on the Boeing 777, which was passing over the conflict zone while flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, killed all 298 people aboard.

A joint investigative team from Australia, Belgium, Malaysia, the Netherlands and Ukraine identified a Russian military unit in charge of the antiaircraft missile system and has pursued prosecution of Russian and Ukrainian citizens allegedly involved. But Russia has continued to deny any involvement in the incident.

Ukrainian authorities came under criticism in 2014 for their failure to close the airspace over the conflict zone regions of Donetsk and Luhansk at higher altitudes, and they could again face questions about why the Ukrainian airliner was allowed to take off from Tehran despite the danger Iranian missiles presented in the skies over the country.

Vadym Prystaiko, Ukraine’s foreign minister, said Friday that the Ukraine International Airlines flight was in the correct corridor upon takeoff and there was nothing to indicate the flight was in danger. Flights from other carriers also departed from the city’s airport in the hours before the Ukrainian flight’s takeoff.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration issued a notice about 2 1/2 hours before the Ukrainian airliner took off prohibiting American carriers and commercial operators from flying in the airspace over Baghdad, the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman.

Ukrainian aviation authorities didn’t issue a similar notice for its carriers at the time. Iranian civil aviation authorities also could have issued a notice closing the airspace over the country. Known as NOTAMs, or notices to airmen, such memos are regularly transmitted to pilots.

Top Ukrainian officials were already thinking about flight safety in the region before Ukrainian International Airlines Flight 752 took off from Tehran’s international airport just after 6 a.m. on Jan. 8. Zelensky had been vacationing with his family in Oman over the Ukrainian holidays, and concerns arose about whether it would be safe for him to fly back to Kyiv.

Ultimately, Zelensky returned to Ukraine only after the Boeing 737 crashed. According to a person familiar with the matter, despite discussion among top officials about the safety of Zelensky’s travel back from Oman, no one in the Ukrainian government moved to close the airspace for the country’s commercial carriers.

Ukraine has taken an active role in investigating the crash of the jet, which was carrying 11 Ukrainians, including the crew. A team of 45 experts and search-and-rescue personnel from Ukraine, including specialists who helped investigate the Malaysia Airlines flight downing, arrived in Tehran early Thursday to participate in the probe.

Cunningham reported from Istanbul. Paul Sonne in Washington contributed to this report.

‏Source www.washingtonpost.com