Missile may have downed jet

A TOP Ukrainian security official yesterday set out what he said were the four main theories why a Ukrainian airliner crashed in Iran the previous day killing 176 people, including a possible missile strike and terrorism.

Oleksiy Danylov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council, made his statement as an initial report by Iranian investigators said the plane, a Boeing 737-800, had been on fire immediately before it crashed. Ukraine is looking at various possible causes of the crash, including a missile attack, a collision, an engine explosion or terrorism, he wrote in a Facebook post.

The crash happened hours after Iran launched missile attacks on US-led forces in Iraq, leading some to speculate that the plane may have been hit. But an initial assessment by Western intelligence agencies was that the plane had suffered a technical malfunction and had not been brought down by a missile, five security sources said.

Danylov said Ukrainian investigators in Iran wanted to search the crash site for possible debris of a Russian missile after seeing reports about its possible existence on the internet.

He referred to an unverified image being circulated on Iranian social media purportedly showing the debris of a Russian-made Tor-M1 surface-toair missile of the kind used by the Iranian military. He said Ukraine would draw on expertise learnt from carrying out its own investigation into the 2014 shooting down of Malaysia Airlines flight MH-17 over eastern Ukraine, an incident that killed all 298 people on board.

Meanwhile, Iranian Transport Minister Mohammad Eslami yesterday rejected speculation about a “suspicious” crash. “The plane caught fire due to a technical defect, and this resulted in a crash,” Eslami said.

Ukrainian state media reported that the most likely cause was an engine fire. All 176 people on board the Ukrainian International Airlines (UIA) Boeing 737 passenger jet died when it crashed in a field near Tehran shortly after take-off. Both black boxes have been found and are being examined by Iranian aviation experts.

The public prosecutor’s office in Tehran has confirmed that the remains of all passengers have been brought to forensics experts.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky declared Thursday a national day of mourning, with flags at government buildings to be flown at half-mast, his office said in a statement. |