A Canadian court in the province of Ontario on May 20 ruled that Iran’s destruction of a Ukrainian passenger plane in January 2020, which killed all 176 people on board, was an “act of terrorism.”
The court also ruled that Iran owes compensation to the four families of people killed in the crash who sued Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, who are responsible for the incident.
“I find on a balance of probabilities that the missile attacks on Flight 752 were intentional and directly caused the deaths of all onboard,” Justice Edward Belobaba wrote.
“I further find on a balance of probabilities that, at the time in question, there was no armed conflict in the region,” he added.
Iran’s Foreign Ministry soon released a statement, calling the court’s ruling “shameful.”
“Everyone knows that the Canadian court is fundamentally not qualified to judge this aviation accident or potential negligence in an incident that is outside the territory and jurisdiction of Canada,” said the ministry’s spokesman, Saeed Khatibzadeh. He added the ruling was “predictable, considering the country’s history of making moves against the Islamic Republic.”
Flight 752 of Ukrainian International Airlines was shot down by two missile strikes on Jan. 8 last year, minutes after it took off from Tehran. All of the people on board, most of whom were Iranian and Canadian citizens, died in the crash, including eleven Ukrainians.
Initially, Iran denied responsibility, but then admitted to unintentionally shooting down the plane and called it a “disastrous mistake” by the Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, a branch of Iranian armed forces.
The officials in Iran said that an air defense operator thought the Ukrainian plane was an American cruise missile, and fired at it due to tensions with the U.S. at the time. Hours before the incident, Iran fired ballistic missiles at U.S. military bases in Iraq in retaliation for the killing of top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani by American forces.
Read more: Ukrainian airplane’s destruction in Iran may have been intentional act, new recording reveals
