Zarif urges against politicization of flight 752 tragedy

TEHRAN (defapress) – Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has urged against any attempt at politicizing the recent tragedy involving unintentional shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane outside Tehran.

News ID: 79930

Date: 18 January 2020 - 10:47

“Politicization of this tragedy must be rejected. Focus on victims’ families,” Zarif tweeted on Friday after meeting with Canadian FM Francois-Philippe Champagne in the Omani capital Muscat. The meeting took place at Ottawa’s request during Zarif’s stopover in Muscat after returning from a security conference in New Delhi.

Zarif said the meeting was held ”to discuss consular, technical & legal cooperation among nations impacted by #PS752 tragedy.” The two sides “agreed on continued exchanges between respective experts,” he noted.

According to a statement by the Iranian Foreign Ministry, the Iranian and Canadian FMs agreed to hold another meeting in the future and it was also decided that the expert teams of two ministries would continue contacts on the plane tragedy.

Carrying 167 passengers and nine crewmembers, Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752 crashed outside Iran’s capital last Wednesday, moments following takeoff from the city’s Imam Khomeini airport, after being mistakenly identified by Iranian air defenses with an incoming cruise missile.

The General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic later identified the cause of the incident as human error.

Message end/