Air Ukraine

Eduardo del Buey
Photo: Afp
La Jornada Maya

Tuesday, January 14th, 2020

On January 8th an Air Ukraine plane taking off from Teheran to Kyiv was shot down by Iranian ground to air missiles. This happened immediately after Iran had launched an attack on two US air bases in Iraq in response to the assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani in a US drone attack in Baghdad ordered by President Trump. At the time of the missile strike, Iranian air defense forces were watching nervously for a US counterattack that likely contributed to the tragedy.

Al this could well have been avoided had Iran done two things: calibrate its air defense forces to ensure that commercial airliners would not be targeted, and ban all air traffic from Teheran until the situation calmed down.

That the Iranians did neither resulted in the deaths of 176 innocent passengers, 57 of whom were Canadian citizens and many more who were Iranian citizens en route to Canada to study or visit.

I will not comment further on the military nature of this crisis but, rather, on the handling of crisis communications by both Canadian and Iranian officials.

Proper crisis communications calls for honesty, transparency, empathy, and full disclosure.

It calls for immediate action to address the concerns of victims and ensure full accountability.

After receiving news of the crash Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau immediately held a press conference to share his grief with Canadians. As soon as Intelligence reports were verified, he again immediately held a press conference to share the reasons why the plane crashed.

Throughout, he reached out to the families and visited with many and, in fact, shed tears with some. He convened his crisis management group, provided families and the public with all of the information at his government’s disposal, dispatched an emergency consular team to Ankara, Turkey, to obtain visas for onward travel to Teheran (Canada has no embassy in Iran), and assured the families of victims that they would have access to the complete support of the Canadian government in repatriating the remains of the victims as well as the necessary visas for foreign based family members who would wish to travel to Canada to attend funerals.

The Prime Minister and his team managed the crisis exceptionally well from a communications point of view. Their first focus was on the families of the victims who needed up to date information, empathy, and an advocate against an often-hostile Iranian government. He expressed his fury at the senseless loss of lives, many of them Canadian. From the start he demanded that Iran assume responsibility for this disaster and address the myriad issues surrounding this tragedy.

In his conversation with Iranian President Rouhani it is reported that the Prime Minister was forceful in demanding consular access for Canadian diplomats, a full accounting of the causes for the downing of the aircraft, full accountability by Iran, and the participation of Canadian air disaster technicians in the investigation of this tragedy.

All in all, textbook crisis communications management.

From the Iranian viewpoint, things went differently.

At the outset, Iranian authorities denied responsibility and sought to blame of the United States for creating the warlike atmosphere in the region.

This all changed on January 10th when the Iranian leadership admitted that the downing of the aircraft had been a tragic mistake by their own forces. By coming out and admitting fault, the Iranians finally entered a more positive crisis communications mode.

That the admission came two days late has been explained by a number of intelligence sources as being the fault of Iranian military authorities who only informed the civilian government and Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei on Friday morning that the missiles had indeed been Iranian.

Once informed, Iranian officials issued the admission and accepted the accusations of the international community that they had vehemently denied since the downing.

This is yet another demonstration that, in crisis management, internal communications must be instantaneous and accurate, and a permanent culture of information sharing must be in place.

That Iranian military leaders did not inform civilian leaders immediately is undoubtedly the result of how communications are handled in this and most authoritarian regimes.

But, that the Iranian civilian leadership immediately reversed their position and admitted that the plane had been shot down accidentally by Iranian forces was a major step in the right direction.

President Rouhani telephoned Prime Minister Trudeau on January 11th to express his regrets at what had happened and admit that the mistake was on the Iranian side. This was another positive move on the part of Iran.

Now, Iran must pursue a full and transparent investigation of what happened and include international experts in this exercise to ensure complete credibility. It must work closely with Canadian and Ukrainian authorities in order to ensure that victims’ remains are repatriated as soon as possible, and must immediately begin working with the families of victims to assign financial compensation for their loss. While no amount of money replaces the loss of a loved one, it would be a demonstration of remorse by the Iranian government and an indication of their determination to take solid steps to avoid such an incident in future.

However, the Iranian government will also have to take legal measures after the investigation is completed and prosecute those guilty of the actual order to fire the missiles and those responsible for withholding vital information from the proper authorities.

Indeed, since the admission, Iranians themselves have, at great personal risk, taken to the streets to express their outrage, with protesters chanting slogans against the Revolutionary Guards and against the Supreme Leader himself.

The dual Iranian and Canadian victims, as well as the Iranian victims are all considered Iranian citizens under Iranian law. Hence the ire of average Iranians at their government for massacring so many citizens. Iranians who had been engaged in anti-government demonstrations in previous weeks now have a new issue to reignite their passion.

So, Iran faces a triple crisis communications challenge.

The first is to express adequate words and deeds of contrition that provide a sense of closure eventually for the families and friends of the victims of the disaster, themselves victims given the pain and sense of loss that they are currently suffering.

The second is to assume full responsibility for this tragic action on the part of its armed forces and demonstrate a complete openness in not only investigating fully the tragedy with no holds barred, but also sanctioning those responsible and undertaking in modifying its military doctrines to ensure that this never happens again.

The third is to allow its own citizens at home to vent their anger, allow them to express their views with no oppressive responses and demonstrate to the Iranian street that the regime will make the necessary changes.

Absent adopting these three strategies immediately and simultaneously, the crisis will not only isolate Iran further from the international community, but could also result in increasing instability within Iran and a direct threat to the regime.

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