TEHRAN: Iran has sentenced ten members of the military forces to prison for their roles in the downing of a Ukrainian airliner, according to the judiciary’s Mizan Online website on Sunday.
On January 8, 2020, Iranian soldiers shot down Ukraine International Airlines aircraft PS752 shortly after takeoff from Tehran, killing all 176 people on board. The majority were Iranians and Canadians, with many holding dual citizenship.
According to Mizan, a commander earned the harshest penalty of ten years in prison for defying orders and shooting down the plane.
According to Mizan, nine other personnel were sentenced to one to three years in prison.
According to Mizan, the commander of a Tor M-1 surface-to-air missile system “fired two missiles” at the airplane “contrary to orders” and without authority.
It did not name any of the defendants.
Three days after the Kyiv-bound jet was shot down, the Iranian military admitted to a “mistake.”
“Given the extent of the effects and consequences of this action, the main defendant was sentenced to the maximum penalty,” Mizan Online wrote on Sunday, without providing any other specifics.
Tensions between Iran and the US were high at the time the airplane was shot down.
Iranian air defenses were on high alert for a US response after Tehran fired missiles at an American military station in Iraq.
These missiles were launched in response to the death of Major General Qassem Soleimani, the chief of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps’ external operations wing, in a US drone attack in Baghdad.
The airline catastrophe claimed the lives of 11 Ukrainian citizens.
In November 2021, Iran’s judiciary announced that a trial for ten military members “of various ranks” in connection with the downing of the jet had begun in Tehran.
Iran announced in January of last year that it had begun paying compensation to the families of those deceased.
According to Arash Khodaei, vice president of the country’s Civil Aviation Organization, “the sum of $150,000 has been transferred” to certain families, and “the process has begun” for others.
The payment “does not infringe upon (their) right to take legal action,” he said, according to state news agency IRNA.
Iran offered “$150,000 or the equivalent in euros” to each of the victims’ relatives in 2020
.
Ukrainian and Canadian officials were outraged by the statement, claiming that compensation should not be decided by unilateral declarations.
In early 2022, Iran announced that it has began compensating some victims’ families with $150,000, vowing to compensate the remaining relatives.
In a verdict made public in January 2022, a Canadian court awarded more than $80 million in compensation to the families of six of the victims.
An Iranian couple filed a rare lawsuit against three senior Iranian officials the same month over the loss of their children in the incident, according to an Iranian publication at the time.
In December, a coalition of countries led by Canada called for an arbitrator to resolve claims against Iran, the first step toward possibly filing a lawsuit at the International Court of Justice, which victims’ relatives have long sought.
