BEIRUT: The bodies of seven victims of Sunday’s air crash in Iran were brought down from the mountainous crash site on Wednesday, according to Mizan, the official news site of the Iranian judiciary.
There were no survivors among the 65 passengers and crew on the plane that plowed into a mountaintop in southwest Iran.
The bodies of 32 passengers have so far been found and many of the remaining bodies are buried under ice and snow, state media reported.
“The first team that went to the crash site was able to bring back a few of the bodies of those who lost their lives and deliver them to the medical authorities at the bottom of the mountain a few minutes ago,” Mohsen Momeni, the director of the Isfahan branch of the Red Crescent told the semi-official Mehr news agency on Wednesday.
The black box of the airplane has still not been found local officials told state TV.
The Aseman Airlines plane disappeared from radar screens 50 minutes into Sunday’s flight from Tehran to the southwestern city of Yasuj. The Iranian military located the wreckage in the central province of Isfahan on Tuesday morning.
Glacial temperatures and the mountainous terrain hampered search efforts in recent days, adding to the grief and anger felt by families of the victims in a society plagued by risky air travel where officials blame decades of sanctions for the poor state of national fleet.
The twin-engined turboprop ATR 72 that crashed was more than 24 years old. According to data cited by the Flight Safety Foundation’s aviation-safety.net website, it was restored to service just three months ago after being in storage for six years.
More than 100 people demonstrated on Monday outside a local government office in nearby Dena Kooh county, demanding officials step down for their handling of the disaster after announcements that wreckage had been found on Monday were then denied.
Any individuals whose actions may have led to the crash will be confronted, Mahmoud Vaezi, the head of Iran’s presidency office, said Wednesday, according to Mehr.
Iran has suffered several plane crashes in recent decades. Tehran blames US sanctions for preventing it from importing new aircraft or spare parts.
A Boeing 727 crashed in northwest Iran in 2011, killing 78 people, and in 2009 all 168 people on board died when a Caspian Airlines Tupolev crashed en route for Armenia. In 2003 an Ilyushin-76 troop carrier crashed in southeast Iran, killing all 276 Revolutionary Guard soldiers on board as well as crew.
A deal with world powers on Tehran’s nuclear program in 2015 opened the way for Iranian airlines to update their fleets but many older planes are still in service, particularly on domestic routes.
Bodies recovered from Iran plane crash site
Bodies recovered from Iran plane crash site
US military operations ‘ahead of schedule,’ Iranian leaders want to talk: Trump
- Trump also said Sunday that 48 Iranian leaders have been killed in the US-Israeli bombardments
- Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said a leadership council had temporarily assumed duties
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that Iran’s new leadership wants to talk to him and that he has agreed, according to an interview with the Atlantic magazine.
“They want to talk, and I have agreed to talk, so I will be talking to them. They should have done it sooner. They should have given what was very practical and easy to do sooner. They waited too long,” Trump said in the interview from his Florida residence. Trump did not specify who he would be speaking with or say whether it would occur on Sunday or Monday.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said a leadership council composed of himself, the judiciary head and a member of the powerful Guardians Council had temporarily assumed the duties of supreme leader following the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Trump said some of the people who were involved in recent talks with the US are no longer alive.
“Most of those people are gone. Some of the people we were dealing with are gone, because that was a big — that was a big hit,” he was quoted as saying in the interview with Atlantic staff writer Michael Scherer. “They should have done it sooner, Michael. They could have made a deal. They should’ve done it sooner. They played too cute.”
Offensive moving ‘ahead of schedule’
Trump also said Sunday that 48 Iranian leaders have been killed in the US-Israeli bombardments of the country and that the offensive is “very positive.”
“Nobody can believe the success we’re having, 48 leaders are gone in one shot. And it’s moving along rapidly,” Trump was quoted as saying in an interview by Fox News.
Trump claimed overall success in the war, which was launched Saturday with the goal of removing Iran’s leadership and destroying its military. Iran has confirmed the death of its supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.
“We’re doing our job not just for us but for the world. And everything is ahead of schedule,” Trump was quoted as saying in a separate interview with CNBC.
“Things are evolving in a very positive way right now, a very positive way,” he said.
The interviews were conducted before the US military for the first time announced casualties in the war: three unidentified service members killed, five seriously wounded and several others more lightly injured.
Central Command (CENTCOM) also announced that the US had sunk an Iranian warship at a dock in the Gulf of Oman.
