One year since Ukrainian Airlines tragedy, families of victims have no peace

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region—  Pictures of smiling faces, young and old, peer out from wreaths of flowers -- portraits of young children in the embrace of happy parents, of newly-wed couples, of young girls standing over birthday cakes, ready to blow out candles and make a wish for the year ahead. None of them knew that their lives would be painfully cut short on January 8, 2020.

“Oh mother, they were cut into pieces,” said one mourner caught on film, her cries accompanied by the wails of other mask-clad grievers who had gathered at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini airport to mark the first anniversary of the Ukrainian Airlines disaster.

“Mother, mother,” one woman cries in another video. “They were the geniuses of Iran.”

“Dadkhahi,” others chant. “We want justice.”

And justice is what many of them are demanding.

A total of 167 passengers boarded Ukrainian Airlines Flight 752, at Imam Khomeini airport early that January morning, to be served by nine crew members. Most were heading to Canada from Iran, returning from inter-semester holidays and visits to their families across the country.  Many spoke of an eagerness to leave Iran, a country even tenser than usual because of Washington’s assassination of Qasem Soleimani, the Commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force, just days earlier.

None of them would make it home.

“Iranian officials (Sepah [IRGC], Basijis, government...) have put pressure on families from the very first minutes after shooting down the plane by two missiles,” Armin Morattab, who lost his twin brother and sister-in-law in the disaster, told Rudaw English via email on Thursday.

Morattab is the CEO of the PS752 justice group – an association of families seeking justice for their loved ones lost in the incident.

“Iran is trying to wash the blood from his hands and run from the crime,” he said.

Flight PS752 was shot down from the sky by the IRGC at around 6 am local time. Video footage shows the flaming remains of the aircraft crashing to earth with an explosion in the village of Shahedshahr, near the capital.

Contrary to international reports, Iranian officials initially denied any involvement in the shooting down of the plane, before admitting three days later that its IRGC troops shot the airliner down “by mistake”, following Iranian attacks on a US base in neighbouring Iraq. Two weeks later, Iran admitted to firing not one, but two missiles at the jet, 25 seconds apart.

Protests erupted out across the country over the downing of the liner, just months after Iranian authorities killed 1,500 people in demonstrations that protested the rising cost of fuel. 

In May, Human Rights Watch said 12 people had been prosecuted for taking part in the January marches – accusing Tehran of “dodging responsibility” over the crash. 

One year on, the group Morattab leads is fighting for justice to be served for their loved ones – but say they are being harassed and insulted by Tehran, who has yet to offer real justice for their dead. He says Iranian authorities subject the relatives of victims to “vast psychological and physical torture,” including forcing families to bury relatives in “pre-selected graves,” hosting IRGC members for interviews in their homes, and threatening and physically torturing families who object to their rulings on the attack.

Much like those killed in the November 2019 protests, Iran labelled those killed on Flight 752 as martyrs – a label Morattab rejects.

“’Martyr’ in our culture has a different meaning. It is when someone goes of his own free will and is killed for the better of his society. Our beloved ones were not aware of the war situation that was taking place in the region and they were only coming back to Canada.”

Ontario’s Western University, which lost four of its students onboard the flight, flew its flag at half-mast and lit its buildings purple to mark the anniversary. Meanwhile, in Iran – where commemorations took place yesterday - even grieving is policed. 

“Police forces were blocking the roads to Shahedshahr… when the number of families rose and they complained… police let them go to the crash site. The security agents were filming the families and were writing down the car numbers for later use.”

Iran announced earlier this month that it would award $150,000 in compensation to the family of each victim, a move which Morattab described as a “slap in the face.”

“How is it possible that Iran offers compensation to families without doing any investigation?” he said. “Only after an independent investigation and law enforcement should the discussion for compensation be started.”

Ukrainian Airlines has accused Iran of “dragging its feet” on a probe into the crash, delaying the delivery the plane’s black box to French investigators, and has instead blamed the crash on “US adventurism.”

On Thursday, Iran’s foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted on the disaster, saying the tragedy was being commemorated with “heavy hearts.”

After the crash, the IRGC described the deaths as “very difficult and sad for everybody” – but did little to relieve the families of the victims of their pain. 

“A murderer may not be the grieving party, and this much is clear,” the PS752 justice group said in a statement on December 22, calling on Tehran to release the names of those responsible for the attack. 

“The Islamic Republic of Iran killed 176 innocent passengers on board of Flight PS752 nearly a year ago, and ever since then, they have done everything to deny their crime while trying to hijack our grief in pretense,” the statement continued.

As families remembered the painful loss of their loved ones this week, Tehran has stepped up both its anti-US rhetoric – saying it will refuse to import US-made vaccines and is not planning a turn to the nuclear deal unless US sanctions are lifted – and strengthened its presence in the Persian Gulf.

After the seizure of a South Korean-flagged vessel on Monday, an IRGC commander visited Bandar Abbas in the Gulf to inaugurate missile systems similar to those that brought down Flight 752.

“Our logic in defending the territorial integrity, the independence and the achievements of the Islamic revolution is to grow stronger,” state media quoted Hossein Salami as saying. 

Justice, however, seems to be off the agenda for now.

With reporting by Fazel Hawramy