Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752: the position on 14 January 2020
A look back at what was established, and what Tehran and Ottawa had said, in the days before 14 January 2020 about the downed Tehran–Kyiv flight.
What was known by 14 January 2020 about the loss of Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752? The flight, a Boeing 737-800 on the Tehran–Kyiv route, was shot down shortly after takeoff on 8 January 2020 by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, killing all 176 people on board.
The days before 14 January had brought a sharp change in Iran's account. On 10 January, after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau suggested the plane had been downed by an Iranian missile, Iranian authorities rejected the idea. The head of Iran's civil aviation body said he was certain no missile had hit the aircraft and continued to cite mechanical failure as the cause.
That position did not last. On 11 January, the President of Iran officially acknowledged that Iran's armed forces had shot the aircraft down by mistake with a missile near Tehran.
On 9 January, Trudeau had said at a news conference that it was too early to draw definitive conclusions that the downing was an act of war. He also condemned Iran's attack on U.S. bases in Iraq.
By 14 January 2020, then, the official Iranian explanation had moved from mechanical failure to an admission of a mistaken missile strike, within three days of the denial.
