US sanctions ‘directly linked’ to Iranian chopper tragedy: Lavrov

The Cradle, May 21, 2024 — 

Iran has for years struggled to maintain its fleet of aircraft, including helicopters, as a result of rampant western sanctions.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on 21 May that US sanctions on aviation programs are directly linked to unsafe flight conditions, in a comment alluding to the crash that killed the Iranian president, foreign minister, and other top officials on 19 May. 

“The Americans disown this, but the truth is that other countries against which the United States announced sanctions do not receive spare parts for American equipment, including aviation,” Lavrov said. 

“We are talking about deliberately causing damage to ordinary citizens who use these vehicles, and when spare parts are not supplied, this is directly related to a decrease in the level of safety,” the Russian diplomat added. 

His comments came the same day as a Financial Times (FT) report citing analysts as saying that US sanctions on Iranian aviation played a role in the sudden deaths of Iran’s top officials in a helicopter crash. 

“The fault was most likely to be technical problems, given that much of Iran’s air fleet is in dire need of spare parts that Tehran has been unable to buy due to US and other western sanctions.”

Tehran has been forced to contend with “increasingly obsolete equipment” for its aircraft. 

Following the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) and the brief lifting of sanctions on the Islamic Republic, Iran made deals with Boeing and Airbus worth over $40 billion to improve its fleet. However, the sudden US withdrawal from the deal and reimposition of harsh sanctions on Iran in 2018 abruptly shut down those opportunities. 

Lavrov’s comments come a day after the Washington Post reported that 430 accidents had taken place with the same helicopter type that was flying Ebrahim Raisi, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, and their team – 162 of which involved fatalities, according to a database maintained by the Flight Safety Foundation. 

“The average age of the 15 Bell 212 aircraft registered in Iran was 35 years old — with their maintenance complicated by international sanctions on Iran,” Washington Post said, citing aviation analytics company Circum. 

The 45-year-old US-made BELL 212 helicopter carrying the Iranian president, foreign minister, and their delegation was likely purchased by Iran’s Shah prior to the 1979 revolution that established the Islamic Republic. 

US and western sanctions against Iran – which have prevailed since 1979 – prevent Tehran from purchasing spare parts to maintain its fleet of civilian aircraft, most of which are over two decades old.

Former Iranian foreign minister Javad Zarif said in a phone interview on Monday that he holds the US responsible for the crash, citing Washington’s sanctions on Tehran’s aviation program.

“One of the causes of this tragic event is the United States, which sanctioned the sale of the aviation industry to Iran,” Zarif said. 

He added that US sanctions prevent Iran from maintaining adequate aviation facilities, adding that the crash will be “recorded in the blacklist of American crimes against the Iranian nation.”

The Iranian Army’s Chief of Staff, Major General Mohammad Bagheri, ordered an investigation into the crash on 20 May.