(OTTAWA) A group of four countries, led by Canada, announced on Wednesday that they have demanded that Tehran submit to binding arbitration to “hold Iran responsible” for the crash of the Ukrainian Boeing, nearly three years after the disaster. .
Canada, Ukraine, Sweden and the United Kingdom rely on the 1971 Montreal Convention, which regulates offenses against civil aviation, to seek this arbitration.
The agreement provides that if the parties do not agree on the organization of the arbitration within the next six months, the dispute could be submitted to the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the highest court of the UN. which sits in The Hague.
“The relatives of the victims of flight PS752 shot down by Iran deserve justice,” said Mélanie Joly, Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs on Twitter.
“This week, we took an important step towards that goal and we will continue to work together to hold Iran accountable for this tragedy,” she continued.
This is an “important step,” said Hamed Esmaeilion, spokesperson for the Association of Families of Robbery Victims, in a video posted on the same social network. “Today is a day we have been waiting for a long time,” he said.
On January 8, 2020, the Iranian armed forces shot down the Boeing operating Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752 to connect Tehran to Kyiv, causing the death of the 176 occupants, mostly Iranians and Canadians.
They did not admit until three days later that they had shot down the aircraft “by mistake”.
The countries have been negotiating with Iran for a long time to obtain compensation for the families of the victims.