Iran told the UN’s aviation agency on Wednesday that it would send black boxes from a downed Ukrainian jetliner to Paris for analysis, once countries involved in the investigation agree, two sources familiar with the matter said.
The other countries involved are Ukraine, Canada and the United States. Canada previously pressed Iran to send the black boxes to France for analysis.
Iran has refused to hand over the flight recorders from the Ukraine International Airlines flight, which was shot down on Jan. 8 near Tehran by an Iranian surface-to-air missile, killing 176 people including 55 Canadian citizens and 30 permanent residents.
In March, Iran told the UN’s aviation agency that it would send the black boxes to Ukraine.
But on Wednesday, a representative from Iran told a virtual meeting of the agency’s governing council that Tehran would now send the heavily damaged recorders to France’s BEA air accident investigation agency.
“Iran said they will send them to Paris soon subject to agreement of the states involved in the investigation,” said one of the sources who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Iranian officials were not immediately available for comment. A spokeswoman for Canadian Transport Minister Marc Garneau declined to comment on discussion of the boxes being sent to Paris.
“Iran made a commitment in March. They showed an openness to transferring the black boxes but we want to see concrete action on their part to see it through,” she said.
Under UN rules, Iran retains overall control of the investigation while the United States and Ukraine are accredited as the countries where the jet was respectively built and operated. Canada has also played a role as the home of many of the accident’s victims. (Reporting By Allison Lampert; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
Iran says will now send Ukraine airliner black boxes to Paris
https://arab.news/b2v3w
Iran says will now send Ukraine airliner black boxes to Paris
- Tehran would now send the heavily damaged recorders to France’s BEA air accident investigation agency
- The plane was shot down on Jan. 8 near Tehran by an Iranian surface-to-air missile
Aid workers find little life in El-Fasher after RSF takeover
- First UN visit to the devastated Sudanese city finds traumatized civilians in ‘unsafe conditions’
PORT SUDAN: Traumatized civilians left in Sudan’s El-Fasher after its capture by paramilitary forces are living without water or sanitation in a city haunted by famine, UN aid coordinator Denise Brown said on Monday.
El-Fasher fell to the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in October after more than 500 days of siege, and last Friday, a small UN humanitarian team was able to make its first short visit in almost two years.
Mass atrocities, including massacres, torture, and sexual violence, reportedly accompanied the capture of the city. Satellite pictures reviewed by AFP show what appear to be mass graves.
FASTFACT
From a humanitarian point of view, UN aid coordinator Denise Brown said, El-Fasher remains Sudan’s ‘epicenter of human suffering’ and the city — which once held more than a million people — is still facing a famine.
Brown described the city as a “crime scene,” but said human rights experts would carry out investigations while her office focuses on restoring aid to the survivors.
“We weren’t able to see any of the detainees, and we believe there are detainees,” she said.
From a humanitarian point of view, she said, El-Fasher remains Sudan’s “epicenter of human suffering” and the city — which once held more than a million people — is still facing a famine.
“El-Fasher is a ghost of its former self,” Brown said in an interview.
“We don’t have enough information yet to conclude how many people remain there, but we know large parts of the city are destroyed. The people who remain, their homes have been destroyed.”
“These people are living in very precarious situations,” warned Brown, a Canadian diplomat and the UN’s humanitarian coordinator in Sudan.
“Some of them are in abandoned buildings. Some of them ... in very rudimentary conditions, plastic sheeting, no sanitation, no water. So these are very undignified, unsafe conditions for people.”
Since April 2023, Sudan has been gripped by a conflict between the regular army and its former allies, the RSF, which has triggered a humanitarian catastrophe.
Brown said the team “negotiated hard with the RSF” to obtain access and managed to look around, visit a hard-pressed hospital, and some abandoned UN premises — but only for a few hours.
Their movements were also limited by fears of unexploded ordnance and mines left behind from nearly two years of fighting.
“There was one small market operating, mostly with produce that comes from surrounding areas, so tomatoes, onions, potatoes,” she said.
“Very small quantities, very small bags, which tells you that people can’t afford to buy more.”
“There is a declared famine in El-Fasher. We’ve been blocked from going in. There’s nothing positive about what’s happened in El-Fasher.
“It was a mission to test whether we could get our people safely in and out, to have a look at what remains of the town, who remains there, what their situation is,” she said.
The war in Sudan has killed tens of thousands of people, driven 11 million from their homes, and caused what the UN has declared “the world’s worst humanitarian disaster.”
