Iran’s announcement on Wednesday that it is to pay US$150,000 to each family of those killed in the accidental downing of a Ukrainian passenger plane was promptly slammed by Kiev as “unacceptable.”
Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 crashed shortly after taking off from Tehran on Jan. 8 last year, killing all 176 people aboard.
Iran admitted three days later that its forces mistakenly shot down the Kiev-bound Boeing 737-800 after firing two missiles amid heightened US-Iran tensions.
“The Cabinet approved the provision of US$150,000, or the equivalent in euros ... for the families and survivors of each of the victims of the Ukrainian plane crash as soon as possible,” the Iranian presidency said, the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported. “This compensation does not prevent the prosecution of the criminal element of the case before the competent judicial authority.”
Kiev said the compensation amount should be the subject of negotiations “establishing the causes of the tragedy and bringing those responsible to justice.”
The Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that it was waiting for Iran to give it “a draft technical report” on the circumstances of the downing of the plane as part of agreements it has failed to fulfill.
“This situation is especially unacceptable since we are talking about the fate of innocent people,” ministry spokesman Oleg Nykolenko said.
Many of those killed in the air disaster were Iranians and Canadians.
The Iranian civil aviation authority has said that a misalignment of an air defense unit’s radar system was the key “human error” that led to the plane’s downing.
Tehran’s air defenses had been on high alert at the time in case the US retaliated against Iranian strikes hours earlier on US troops stationed in Iraq, which in turn had been a response to the US assassination of Iranian major general Qassem Soleimani.
Iranian Minister of Transport and Urban Development Mohammad Eslami said that the final crash report would be “soon” made public, including a version in English.
“The owner of the plane, Ukraine and Boeing were present for the investigation,” Eslami was quoted as saying by IRNA.
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