Canada, Allies Urge Iran To Set Date For Downed Airline Reparations Talks - Statement

Canada and three other nations affected by the downing of the Ukrainian International Airlines flight PS752 by Iran are calling on Tehran to schedule a date to formally begin negotiations on reparations, the International Coordination and Response Group for the victims of Flight PS752 said on Thursday

TORONTO (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 03rd June, 2021) Canada and three other nations affected by the downing of the Ukrainian International Airlines flight PS752 by Iran are calling on Tehran to schedule a date to formally begin negotiations on reparations, the International Coordination and Response Group for the victims of Flight PS752 said on Thursday.

"We now call on Iran to work with us to set a date to formally begin negotiations on reparations," the group, which included the foreign ministers of Canada, Sweden, Ukraine and the United Kingdom, said in a joint statement.

The four nations also made a series of demands on Iran, including to fully acknowledge wrongdoing, publicly apologize, give assurances such an incident would never happen again and prosecute those deemed responsible for the downing of the passenger airplane.

Afghanistan and Germany, whose citizens were also onboard the airplane, initially were part of the group but did not sign the statement.

Flight PS752 crashed shortly after takeoff from Tehran's international airport on January 8, 2020, after being shot down by the Iranian military.

The incident claimed the lives of all 167 passengers - mostly Canadian and Iranian passengers - and nine Ukrainian crew members.

Tehran has admitted that its missile brought down the passenger jet, howeverrejects allegations that the strike was premeditated. The Iranian military maintains it was on high alert at the time of the accident, which happened hours after it fired missiles at two US bases in Iraq in retaliation for the drone strike that killed top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani.

Despite Iran's Civil Aviation Organization concluding last month that PS752 was brought down inadvertently, a Canadian court ruled last month that Iran had deliberately downed the Ukrainian airliner - deeming the incident an act of terrorism under the Criminal Code of Canada.

Tehran slammed the Ontario Superior Court of Justice's as baseless and politically motivated.

Legal analysts told Sputnik that Canadian Justice Edward Belobaba's ruling is "contradictory" as it fails to account for the fact that most of the passengers were either Iranian nationals or dual-citizens.