The husband of a woman killed when Iran shot down a Ukrainian airliner earlier this month has fled the country after allegedly receiving threats from Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence to stay quiet.
Elnaz Nabiyi, a 31-year-old PhD student in the Department of Accounting, Operations and Information Systems in the Alberta School of Business, was killed alongside 175 other people when the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) shot down flight PS752 on January 8.
Her husband, Javad Soleimani Meimandi, said he was threatened and summoned by the Ministry of Intelligence for “insulting” local IRGC commanders and representatives of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who attended Nabiyi’s funeral in her hometown Zanjan.
Soleimani Meimandi called the regime officials “shameless” at the funeral and received threatening messages later that day.
“On the day of the funeral, I received a message telling me to shut my mouth, and that this is my first and last warning,” he wrote in an Instagram post.
Soleimani Meimandi – who is not believed to be related to the slain IRGC commander Qassem Soleimani – added that he was summoned by the Ministry of Intelligence the following day for “insulting” officials.
“I was then forced to quickly leave the country so I can be a voice for the victims of this tragedy,” he said.
In his latest post on Instagram on Friday, Soleimani Meimandi said that Khamenei, as the country’s highest authority, must be held accountable for the shooting down of the Ukrainian airliner.
He also called on the international community to pressure Iran to hand over the black boxes of the downed Ukrainian airliner.
Soleimani Meimandi questioned why Iran did not halt passenger flights and shut its airspace at a time it was firing missiles and accused the Islamic Republic of using passenger planes as shields against potential US retaliation on that day.
Iran carried out missile attacks against US military bases in Iraq in response to the killing of prominent military commander Qassem Soleimani hours before downing the Ukrainian airliner.
