FM:

Iranians Will Never Forget US Downing of Passenger Plane

TEHRAN (defapress) – Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the Iranian nation will never forget the downing of their passenger plane by a US Navy guided-missile cruiser in the Persian Gulf waters in 1988.

News ID: 65250

Date: 04 July 2017 - 11:29

"July 3, 1988, US ship shot down #IR655, killing 290 civilians. Ship capt. was awarded medal for murdering innocents. Iranians won't forget,” Zarif said in a message posted on his Twitter account on Monday night.

On July 3, 1988, Iran Air Flight 655 was on a routine flight from Iran's southern city of Bandar Abbas to Dubai when the US Navy's missile cruiser USS Vincennes shot it down, killing all 290 passengers onboard, including 66 children and crewmembers.

In a statement on Monday, the Iranian Foreign Ministry condemned the missile attack on the Iranian passenger plane and said the Islamic Republic will never forgive the perpetrators behind the "horrible crime” and "inhuman move”.

Ministry condemns "the cowardly and inhumane move” and commemorates the martyrs of the "horrible crime”, the statement added.

"The Iranian nation regards the perpetrators of this tragedy as irrational self-proclaimed advocates of human rights who commit crimes under the pretext of protecting the rights and defending nations,” it noted.