(Téhéran) L’Iran a dénié vendredi à Ottawa le droit d’« exprimer son opinion » sur l’affaire du Boeing ukrainien abattu en 2020 près de Téhéran après la publication d’un rapport canadien très critique des autorités iraniennes sur ce drame ayant fait 176 morts.
« Le Canada n’est pas qualifié pour présenter des rapports ou exprimer son opinion sur la question [de l’]Ukrainian passenger plane,” the official IRNA news agency wrote, citing Mohsen Baharvand, deputy foreign minister in charge of legal and international affairs.
The part of the Canadian report that criticizes the technical side of the report [d’enquête] Iranian day [la catastrophe aérienne] Unjustified and unacceptable ”, adds IRNA, citing the same source.
Ukraine International Airlines (UIA) flight PS752 from Tehran to Kiev on January 8, 2020, crashed shortly after take-off with 176 people on board, including 55 Canadian citizens and 30 permanent residents of Canada. Three days later, the Iranian armed forces finally admitted that they had shot down the plane “by mistake”.
The launch of the missile that brought down the plane was the result of a combination of “recklessness”, “incompetence” and “indifference to human life” on the part of Tehran, although there is no evidence for its conclusion. A report from Canada on the drama was released Thursday.
According to the Government of Canada, this document, drawn up by Canadian experts on the basis of available information, states that “the official version of events presented by Iran is misleading and superficial.”
But for Canadian diplomatic chief Marc Garneau, “the facts are clear”: “Iran is responsible for the deaths of 176 innocent people,” and the affected countries are awaiting Tehran’s response to their demands for compensation.
On the night of the tragedy, Iran’s air defenses were on high alert. The Islamic Republic had just attacked a base used by the US military in Iraq in response to the removal five days ago, in a US strike in Baghdad by General Qassem Soleimani, the architect of Iran’s regional strategy, and Tehran expected a response from Washington.
In its final report on the tragedy revealed in March, Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization (CAO) has washed its armed forces. Ukraine then denounced a “cynical attempt to conceal the real reasons”, and the Ottawa report denounced the report as “incomplete” and without “inconclusive evidence”.
