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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The downing of Ukraine International Airlines Flight PS752 by military forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran, minutes after taking off from Tehran’s Imam Khomeini International Airport (IKA) is unprecedented. The Flight was shot down by Tor-M1 surface-to-air missiles in the hands of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). This incident took place in a state of heightened military tension in the region. The missile strike on Flight PS752 occurred four hours after Iran launched retaliatory missile strikes on US positions in Iraq for the killing of Major General Qassem Soleimani. Iran’s Aircraft Accident Investigation Board (AAIB) published a Final Report on March 17, 2021, yet this was deemed to be incomplete and confusing by the other affected countries—Ukraine, Canada, the United Kingdom, Afghanistan, and Sweden—as well as various aviation and military experts, and the victims’ families. Iran’s report excluded from its scope investigation of the very military that shot down the plane. It did not provide any credible explanation of the downing of Flight PS752 by the IRGC and raised further questions. Various reports have been published since, such as the one written by the Honourable Ralph Goodale, the Prime Minister of Canada’s special advisor on the downing of Flight PS752; the one prepared by Dr. Agnes Callamard, the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur in February 2021; and the report published by Canada’s Forensics Team released in June 2021. These reports attempted to reveal elements of the truth behind the downing and answer many of the unanswered questions surrounding this case. As a result of the lies and obfuscation of the government of Iran, many questions remained unanswered. The Association of Families of Flight PS752 Victims, which represents 140 of the victims, has compiled this report to take an important step towards discovering the truth surrounding the downing of Flight PS752 and bringing the perpetrators to justice. In preparing this report, various resources have been used, including publicly available information, audio files recording conversations with high-ranking Iranian officials, testimonies of the families of the victims, and numerous other published reports on this case. We have also consulted several experts in aviation and relevant military systems as well as lawyers with expertise in applicable law. We cannot blindly accept Iran’s assertions. It is the belief of the Association that high-ranking officials of Iran are responsible for the downing of Flight PS752 and not just a handful of lowranking IRGC members as per the claims of the government of Iran. Some of the conclusions made in this investigative analysis have not been mentioned in any of the other previously published reports, and others are based on information publicly available thus far. There is no doubt that many questions still need to be answered. Some key conclusions made in this report are highlighted below: 1. Airspace Left Open: Following IRGC’s missile strike on American bases in Iraq and only hours prior to the downing of Flight PS752, Iranian authorities kept the airspace open and used civilian air travelers as human shield.
