Court decision reached in Ukrainian plane downing case resulting in 176 fatalities
Military Court in Tehran Sentences 10 Soldiers to Prison for Shooting Down Ukrainian Passenger Plane
After nearly three years of trial, a military court in Tehran has sentenced 10 soldiers of various ranks to prison for their involvement in the accidental shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane over Tehran with missiles in Iran in 2020. According to the Mizan News Agency, which is affiliated with the Iranian Judiciary, one of the first-degree defendants, an unnamed commander, who is said to be the commander of the Tor-M1 air defense system that fired the missiles that hit the plane, was sentenced to 13 years in prison.
The commander was accused in court of «firing two missiles at the plane without obtaining permission, contrary to the instruction of the command center, considering that the characteristics of the target are similar to a cruise missile.» Nine other army members of various ranks, who were tried as second and third-degree defendants, were also sentenced to between 1 and 3 years in prison. The way to appeal the court decision has been left open.
The Boeing 737 type passenger plane, flight number 752, belonging to Ukraine Airlines, crashed shortly after taking off from Tehran International Imam Khomeini Airport to go to Kiev on the morning of 8th January 2020, and there were no survivors of the 176 people on the plane. Iranian officials did not accept claims that the plane was shot down, and then the General Staff announced that the plane was accidentally shot down by two missiles launched by the air defense system as a result of «human error» while passing over a «sensitive military point.»
The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Army launched a missile attack on the US bases in Iraq in retaliation for the killing of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, hours before the plane was shot down. On December 30, 2020, about a year after the incident, Iran announced that it would pay 150,000 dollars compensation to the families of each of those who lost their lives.
In a statement on January 7, 2021, Tehran Chief Military Prosecutor Ghulam Abbas Turki stated that only one of the people found to be at fault in the incident related to the plane crash was detained, while the others were released on bail and tried pending trial. The first hearing of the case was held in November 2021, nearly two years after the incident took place.
