De-Coding Iranian Reticent Resistance

"Iranians are trying to make a political point that Canada really doesn't have a big political interest in this since it was mostly 'Iranians' who were killed."
"It's sickening for them to play this card in these circumstances when families are grieving, but it's what they do."
Dennis Horak, last Canadian Ambassador in Tehran, Iran

"[Iran had been] co-operating with foreign experts in the investigation to date."
"[But it is] imperative that Iran allow for a thorough and credible international safety investigation into the causes of the crash [and that it] assume full responsibility, including by providing compensation."
"[Iran must] move the black boxes to a facility with all of the technology and expertise required to quickly and reliably download and analyze the data without delay [as prescribed by international conventions]."
Ukraine, Canada, Sweden, Afghanistan and the UK

Iran's armed forces purchased the Tor-M1 missile systems from Russia  Reuters

"If they're buried in Iran, it's only going to strengthen the Iranians' argument that they're really just Iranian citizens and they're not dual citizens."
"[In Islam] not burying the body is considered torture of the soul."
"For some families, they may be stuck with the pressure to please bury the body because to retrieve [sic] it to Canada may take more hurdles, and that's not good for the soul of the deceased person."
Bessma Momani, Middle East expert, University of Waterloo

The first repatriated body of a Canadian citizen of the 57 who died in the horrific downing of the Ukraine International Airlines jet after takeoff from Tehran Airport resulting the total death count of all aboard --176 -- has been returned to Canada for burial. The government of Canada has spoken with urgency to Iranian authorities of the need to respect the wishes of Canadian Iranian family members who have expressed their wish that their deceased family member be returned to Canada for burial.

According to authorities, a number of the victims' remains from the plane attack have been buried in Iran, in accord with their family's wishes for a speedy burial as is ordained by Islamic burial rites. Iran has stated it will not recognize the issue of dual citizenship; anyone born in Iran is Iranian, and Iranian exclusively. Iran is not the first nor the only Middle East country refusing to give credence to dual citizenship; it gives them a freer hand in handling their 'citizens' when they return briefly to reunite with family members.

In the instance of the deliberate attack on a civilian passenger jet and the demand by the countries whose nationals were involved; Ukraine, Canada, Afghanistan, the UK and Sweden that financial compensation must be paid by the Islamic Republic to the expatriate dual citizens, the stance of recognizing only Iranian citizenship has a second defined purpose. Refusal to pay compensation based on refusal of recognition of citizenship other than Iranian.

As far as Iran is concerned, only the children aboard who had been born outside of Iran and who were killed on that fated flight, can be considered by them to be non-Iranian citizens. Iran has assured and reassured the countries whose citizens were killed that it would respect the families' wishes, but it has neatly diminished the number of family 'wishes' it will feel obligated to 'respect'. Based on passports, according to Iran's aviation authority only five Canadian nationals were aboard the jetliner.

Ukraine and other countries want Iran to turn over the flight recorders Reuters

As for the release of the black boxes for full investigation of the shooting down of the Ukrainian jet, Iran initially agreed that since it lacks the technical apparatus and the experience to properly lead and interpret the investigation it would release them, as recommended by consensus by the involved five countries, to France for analysis. And then it recanted, claiming its investigators would themselves conduct the required investigation.

At the same time, the report issued by the  Civil Aviation Organization of Iran made it abundantly clear that Iranian investigators had found it "impossible" to read the plane's flight data and cockpit voice recorders - commonly known as the "black boxes" - because they were too technically advanced for their limited investigation capabilities.

"If the appropriate supplies and equipment are provided, the information can be taken out and reconstructed in a short period of time", Iran's Civil Aviation Organization stated in its Monday release of the second preliminary report. In its great wisdom and need to retain control of the situation, Iran has asked authorities in the U.S. and France to forward to them equipment to enable them to download information from the flight recorders.

That same preliminary report on flight PS752, is where the CAOI identified the surface-to-air missiles fired at flight PS752 as coming from a Tor-M1 system, which NATO identifies as the SA-15 "Gauntlet". The report also stated that "the impact of these [two] missiles on the accident and the analysis of this action is under investigation". Ignoring completely the security camera footage suggesting  the plane was struck by two missiles within 23 seconds, shortly after taking off from Imam Khomeini International Airport.
 

The Iranian Theocracy of Terror and Vengeance

"This disaster is a reminder of what it means to be Canadian and to belong to this cosmopolitan nation."
"There is a certain fluidity of identity when you open your doors to the whole world."
"Exile is a longing to belong. It's an emotional space that we confuse with a physical space."
"There is this very strong identity which is based on historical continuity. [Out of a diverse culture in Iran, Iranians treasure a deep attachment to] a rich mystical culture that refuses to be eclipsed despite the wars and invasions of the centuries."
Payam Akhavan, former UN war crimes prosecutor, professor of law, McGill University

Iran is known to have Russian-made Tor missile defence systems   AFP Getty Images

Canada has suddenly lost a large swath of citizens of Iranian heritage. In one fell swoop fate struck down the passenger plane they boarded at Tehran International Airport, bound for Kyiv in Ukraine. They hadn't yet reached cruising height, just several minutes into take-off from the airport when the Boeing 737-800 Ukrainian airliner suddenly burst into flames and plummeted to the ground, shattered, passengers and crew killed in the conflagration and crash.

Their connecting flight from Kyiv to Toronto arrived on schedule in Toronto later, where the 138 passengers of the total 176 that left Tehran, were to deplane, but there was no one to occupy those flight-reserved seats, it arrived void of those passengers, a silent rebuke to fate. A total of 63 Canadians perished in that first leg of their journey from Iran to Canada. Other Iranians had been scheduled to arrive in Canada for various reasons; Iranian students attending university in Canada, people on travel visas.

Delaram Dadashnejad, 26, was studying nutrition at Langara College. (Ksenia Ivanova)

The Canadians whose lives were forfeited when, as now being announced, the plane was hit by a sophisticated missile system, represented a full spectrum of any society; families, business professionals, academics, children, university students. Many of the Iranian students studying at Canadian universities would decide to stay in Canada, to become Canadian citizens; their long-range agenda will now never be realized. An 8-year-old, a 9-year-old and a one-year old child aboard will never see adulthood.

Iranian Canadians hailing from Western Canada to Central Canada are being mourned, their tragic deaths traumatizing their communities, stunning the nation. Toronto was home to such a large contingent of Iranian expatriates it was sometimes referred to within that community as "Tehranto".
Iran, the Islamic Republic of Iran under the Shiite Ayatollahs is nothing like the social and cultural treasurehouse it once was. The militant leadership embracing terrorism as a mode of entry to commanding regional conquest has completely divorced itself from what the West views as civil behaviour.

 U of Toronto student Mojtaba Abbasnezhad, crash victim. (Mojtaba Abbasnezhad/Facebook)

Its relentless and violently injurious embarkation on undermining an already-fractious Sunny-majority mostly Arab Middle East to place Aryan Persia in the ascendancy, its viral anti-Israel pathology where threats against Israel's existence reveal its plans for Iran's future as the authority in the Middle East, its unstoppable search for and research into technological advances in nuclear arms and ballistic missiles of increasing sophistication, its commitment to spurning Western overtures and its ardent support of regional terrorist groups reveal it as a threat to peace, security and stability.

Internal dissent by disaffected Iranians has roiled the country time and again, and the regime's response has been swift, brutal and viciously deadly. The sanctions placed on Iran by a new administration in the United States determined to keep nuclear weaponry out of the regime's possession has disastrously weakened the Republic's economy. But not to the point where they will forego funding their proxy terrorist militias, nor fail to supply them with missiles, nor direct them to sectarian violence.

Samira Bashiri, husband Hamid Setareh Kokab, (Submitted by Sahar Nikoo)

All this is what most expatriate Iranians have sought to escape, to find refuge elsewhere to live aspirational lives of achievement and decency. All the while a yearning for the culture and heritage left behind propels many to return for brief periods, not the least cause of which is to keep in touch with extended family members left behind. That yearning led to the cessation of life itself for those whose misfortune was to be in their country of origin at this critical time.

When an irate theocratic regime whose focus is on the return of the Hidden Mahdi to bring the final destruction of all non-Muslims and the elevation of the faithful to Paradise, and doesn't mind hastening the process reflecting its corrosive scorn for humanity other than those it claims for its own, recklessly sacrifices the lives of innocents to emphasize its contempt for the West and the power it calls 'the Great Satan'.

Rescue teams gather at the scene after a Ukrainian plane carrying 176 passengers crashed near Imam Khomeini airport in the Iranian capital Tehran early in the morning on Jan. 8. Rouhollah Vahdati/ISNA/AFP via Getty Images