Video: Watch exact moment when Ukrainian jetliner was shot down by Iranian surface-to-air missile
As the top leadership of several western countries including the US, UK and Canada blame Iran of shooting down the Ukrainian jetliner, a video has surfaced which claims to show the exact moment that the aircraft was hit by the Iranian missile. The 19-second clip shows a small explosion in its early part and claims that it was the Ukrainian Boeing 737-800 Flight PS752 that was hit by an Iranian missile.
Twitter user @sotiridi while tweeting the video wrote, "#Breaking: Just in - Confirmed video footage of the moment the Ukrainian Boeing had been shot down by Iranian air defence systems."
The authenticity of the video was verified by US media house The New York Times.
The Iranian govt is firm on its stand that the plane crash that took the lives of 167 passengers and 9 crew members occurred due to a technical failure. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, on Wednesday, said, "the crash is not a topic for hype, likes in social networks, sensations and conspiracy theories."
Amongst those killed were 63 Canadians. PM Justin Trudeau on Thursday said that there was sufficient intelligence to believe that Tehran was behind the air crash. “We have intelligence from multiple sources, including our allies and our own intelligence. The intelligence indicates that the plane was shot down by an Iranian surface-to-air missile. This may well have been unintentional,” he told reporters during a press conference in Ottawa, Canada.
This was shortly after US President Donald Trump, a day after his speech 'offering peace to Iran', claimed that he had his own suspicions about Iran's role in this entire incident that occurred on the day that Iran struck US military bases in Iraq as a response to US' killing of top Iranian General Qasem Soleimani.
Iran based-Fars news agency rubbished the 'rumors' calling them 'scientifically impossible'. In a tweet (translated), Fars news agency said -- There is complete coordination between all military and civilian sectors in Iran and at the same time, there were dozens of Iranian and foreign planes flying over Iran's safe space.
An official investigation into the air crash is ongoing with the Iranian and Ukrainian specialists 'downloading information' from the black box(es) recovered from the airliner. Tehran has reportedly asked a Boeing representative to be a part of the investigation. "All these reports are a psychological warfare against Iran," Ali Rabiei, a spokesman for the Iranian government said on Thursday, reported Reuters, citing state TV. "All those countries whose citizens were aboard the plane can send representatives and we urge Boeing to send its representative to join the process of investigating the black box."
Also Read | US, British top-brass accuse Iran of shooting down civilian aircraft; Trudeau backs theory
