‘All those culpable in Ukrainian plane crash should be judged’

Tehran, Jan 7 : Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that “all those culpable” of dereliction of duty in the crash of the Ukrainian plane near Tehran in January 2020 should be judged.

“The judiciary will prosecute all the perpetrators of the incident, this trial is important for us,” Xinhua news agency quoted Rouhani as saying in a televised address on Wednesday.

All the aspects of the incident, he stressed, must be clarified and made known to the public.

The Iranian cabinet, Rouhani further said, has “done its best to clarify the incident” and last week it decided to compensate all the heirs and survivors of the victims, without any discrimination based on nationality or citizenship.

The Iranian authorities are also engaged in dialogues with their Ukrainian counterparts to reach an agreement over compensation for the aircraft, the President added.

The Boeing-737, en route from Tehran to Kiev, was shot down by two rockets shortly after takeoff from Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport on January 8, 2020.

The accident resulted in the deaths of all 167 passengers and nine crew members on board, who were citizens of Ukraine, Iran, Canada, Sweden, Afghanistan, and the UK.

Later, Iran’s armed forces confirmed that an “unintentional” launch of a military missile by the country was the cause of the incident.

In July 2020, the transcript of the black boxes from the plane confirmed the fact of an illegal interference with the plane.

Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from IANS service.