Downing of the Ukrainian plane .. Arrests of Iran and Rouhani vow to investigate and punish those responsible

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that his country will make all efforts to continue finding the facts in the accident of the Ukrainian plane, which was shot down by a missile after it took off from Khomeini Airport last Wednesday, killing all 176 passengers.

Rouhani pledged - in a speech broadcast on television today - that such an error, which he considered "unforgivable," would not be repeated, and called on the judiciary to form a special court headed by a specialized judge to look into the incident. He also demanded that government members stand with the families of the victims.

The Iranian president considered that the military command's recognition of the shooting down of the plane was a good step, and said that officials should explain the reason for the delay in announcing the reasons for the crash.

He added that the person responsible for shooting down the plane should receive his punishment separately from his position, stressing that his government is "responsible to the Iranian nation and other countries that lost nationals in the accident."

In a later development, a spokesman for the Iranian judiciary, Ghulam Hussain Ismaili, announced that the authorities had arrested people for their role in the Ukrainian plane accident.

Confession after denial
And last Saturday, a statement of the General Staff announced that an air defense system belonging to it had shot down a Ukrainian passenger plane due to a human error, the moment it passed over a sensitive military area.

Tehran had initially denied the plane was caused by a missile, and said it had convincing evidence in this regard. After the announcement, Iranian officials apologized for what happened through their Twitter accounts.

The office of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelinsky confirmed that his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani, had apologized on behalf of his country for the downing of the plane.

Zelinsky said that his country insists on the need for Tehran to admit guilt, expressing the hope that Iran responsible for the incident will be brought to justice, return the bodies of the victims, pay compensation and provide an official apology.

The accident killed 176 people on board the ill-fated Boeing 737-800, most of whom were Iranian and Canadian citizenship, some from Ukraine, Afghanistan, Britain and Sweden.

The incident occurred hours after Iran launched missiles targeting two military bases in Iraq, where American soldiers are stationed, in response to the assassination of Washington, commander of the Quds Force, by the Revolutionary Guards in Baghdad.

Invitation to ICAO
In a related context, Iran called on the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), based in Canada, to support the investigation into the shooting down of the Ukrainian plane.

In a statement yesterday, the organization said it had accepted the Iranian government’s invitation and would send a technical team of experts to provide advice and oversight in the investigation. The organization does not usually participate in the investigation itself, but can be invited to act as an observer.

Tehran is leading the investigation but has invited several foreign teams of experts, including Boeing experts alongside Iranian and Ukrainian experts, to come to Tehran and study the conditions of the crash.