International. Commander of irans elite military unit the Islamic Revolutionary guard corps accepted full responsibility for shooting down a ukrainian passenger plane on wednesday he said the boeing 737 was mistaken for a cruise missile. When i heard why it had been shot down i wish i was jet i never wanted to witness such a terrible incident. He also added an air Defense System operator had faulty communications and had just 10 seconds in which to make what was described as a bad decision earlier tehran admitted its military unintentionally hit the jet despite days of denials of any involvement in the downing surrounds chief investigator says the black box data will now be sent my colleague Jacqueline Vega discussed details with our quarter. We heard from ukraines president vladimir selenski who said that he expects he expects irans take full responsibility and for the investigation to continue without any obstruction earlier today we did hear from irans president who promised just that and called this a vent and an forgivable mistake the armed forces internal investigation has concluded that regrettably missiles fired you see human error coups that horrific crash of the ukrainian plane and the death of 176. 00 innocent people investigations continue to identify and prosecute this great tragedy and unforgivable mistake now irans president also promised compensation for the families of the victims and the countrys Supreme Leader has called for the for the findings of this investigation to be made public now earlier we also heard from irans foreign minister who gave actually highlighted the nother reason for why this crisis took place. A sad day preliminary conclusions of incident investigation biome forces human error at a time of crisis caused by us adventurism lead to disaster profound regret apologies and condolences to all people to the families of victims on 2 of the affected nations give us a bit of background here what exactly is the foreign minister referring to oh well just last week a u. S. Airstrike killed a high ranking high ranking could command. Soleimani and that brought tensions in the region to a level that we havent seen in decades this guy was considered a hero to many in iran as he was instrumental for the defeat of isis in syria so the government promised harsh retaliation for his death and that came in the form of several airstrikes against u. S. Military bases in iraq that happened just mere hours before this plane went down so at that time the Iranian Military was intice a painting some sort of possible u. S. Response to those strikes which explains why they thought that this airliner could have been an enemy aircraft they said that it was approaching a military installation clearly tensions were very high are there other cases of countries shooting down planes by mistake yeah unfortunately when tensions are this high like you said accidents are more probable for example during the cold war in 1903 the soviet union mistakenly shot down korean air flight 007 thinking it was a spy plane the plane went into soviet air space at the time that a u. S. Reconnaissance mission was going on as well and in 1908 u. S. Navy shot down and a rainy an airliner killing all 290. 00 passengers because they thought it was in the rainy and fighter jet now at that time the then Vice President george h. W. Bush said he had nothing to apologize for and that he didnt care about the facts regarding the shooting of the plane down. Rounds of mission of guilt has shaken the public mood in tehran the some questioning why the government didnt come clean sooner or the other side knowledge to mistakes can be made in the context of the tense situation intervention. Which us are not to talk about unfortunately when i 1st heard about the plane crash it was said to be a technical issue but the announcement came without any preliminary investigation which is led to doubts around the world but now theyve done the necessary investigation it was clarified that the plane was hit by a missile weve been really sad since this morning when we heard the news and we were angry that people told this line about the russian why didnt you get after our flights should have been cancelled and planes shouldnt have taken off from any air force on the judgment that all of our country was in a state of war and this mistake could have been made by any country america itself hit our air bus and made a similar mistake after iran hit the u. S. Bases we were in total readiness and thats what led to the mistake. We had opinion from various experts whove joined us during this developing story. In times of war and the socalled fog of war unfortunately there is no radar yet able to pierce these fog unless there is that the conflicting mechanism so again one can talk about blame and responsibility or accountability the blame is iranian but the responsibility lies on other shoulders too so iranian Defense Systems were on alert and they were expecting attacks by u. S. Airplanes as stated in the all force as a statement there have been reports that some hostile objects flying objects have been appearing on radar screens in some of some parts around the country so soon as they saw a plane coming to assess. So there are just. You know rush to jump to the conclusion fired strategic errors become tactical blunders the strategy of that regularly being ordered clausing down the. Under extreme circumstances called have avoided this. And that your whenever we have valid doubts in that your we are bound to have a bench and raised guns dog just ready to fight the it will be said that yours appear to be hired to be this and the big picture as to how to diffuse this scenario on how to be escalated this i believe did onions have taken the 1st step and by the initiation process of this whole accident in which 176 people were lost was done by the american to have the video answered yes that is true. You are 60 of status other hard time defending washingtons decision to assassinate irans top general during a News Conference point compost struggle to explain what the imminent threat was allegedly posed by general sort of money as the state department chief was grilled by journalists at the moment has details. Things got quite easy at the press conference where we saw mike pompei o the u. S. Secretary of state speaking alongside steve minutia in the secretary of treasury and this comes just a week after the killing of irans top general qassam solomonic and as the press asked questions got particularly tense mike pompei o seemed a little bit uncomfortable trying to answer the questions of journalists who just dont seem to buy his claim that the killing of solomonic was necessary to protect american lives lets take a listen to some of what went on if you have specific information about the internet and didnt have anything to do with our embassy. We had specific emanation information on an imminent threat and those threats trim included attacks on u. S. Embassies what is your definition of it in that. This was going to happen an american lives are at risk the Intelligence Community is not flawless we we get it wrong in this case the Intelligence Community got it fundamentally right there was an imminent attack it was active plotting is that right now gone with sort of money gone threats are never going now it wasnt just the journalists who dont exactly buy pompei as claims but american lawmakers also have their doubts we just saw in the u. S. House of representatives the lower house of the u. S. Legislative branch a resolution was passed attempting to restrict the activities of the trumpet ministration and trying to prevent them from further escalating tensions with the Islamic Republic of iran however these doubts about whether it was the right thing in order to kill qassam solomonic go well beyond legislators and journalists they actually go to the us public itself we have new poll results that have been conducted and it shows that basically 2 thirds of the u. S. Public believes at this point that the country is less safe because of trumps decision to kill the top iranian general furthermore 69 percent. Then to the u. S. Public believes that iran is more likely to attack the usa as a result of trumps decisions 52 percent describe trump killings qassam solomonic as reckless so a pretty solid opposition to trump killing and qassam solomonic among American People themselves while at the press conference mike peo and steve minutia laid out basically what these new sanctions will include the new sanctions are targeting high level officials in iran basically preventing any business transactions with them but when explaining these new sanctions a mike bomb peo use some rather interesting language to lay out what he argued was the ultimate end game of the United States when it comes to iran the president said we dont want war we want iran to behave with your Noble Mission the reason that the secretary treasurer this morning is to continue this campaign our strategic effort to get to run to behave in a way that doesnt continue their 40 year long effort to terrorize the world if you hear those words he refers to saying that he wants iran to be a quote normal country so essentially it seems the United States is asking lading threats and carrying out more sanctions with the goal of forcing the Islamic Republic to conduct itself in a manner that the United States considers to be normal not exactly clear what that means but until that happens there will be further activities and sanctions and threats and what not now many are hoping that the Current Situation is in a state of deescalation but at the same time people worry about what could happen next you know the sanctions still remain iran still has the capabilities we saw the recent strikes that took place so a lot of nervousness in the Global Community at the moment i think air is still on sanctions at this point but i will get around to that again despite the fact that we dodged a bullet about going to war with iran our last few days were still in the same set piece positions where we were before and. All these guys around the president can think of it how do we turn the screws more more and maximum pressure more and more in oh and this is the next thing i can do a lot of this of this remember is aimed at the europeans i think a lot of this is toward pressuring the europeans to side with the americans in this full pressure campaign. Meanwhile theres growing concern among iraqis that the countrys becoming a battleground between the u. S. And around thousands of people flooded the streets of baghdad on friday calling for an end to the presence of all Foreign Military in the country. Demonstrators waving iraqi flags chanted no to america no to iran while the ranks can take a Prime Minister demanded the u. S. Make preparations to pull all its troops sounds washingtons made it clear its not in turn into leave but rather will stay for good as the explains. Hooved of us are familiar with the situation you invite someone over to stay a while say a friend they stay and stay and stay you drop a hint you know its getting late kind of tired but they just dont get it america is a force for good in the middle east any delegation sent to iraq would be dedicated to discussing how to best recommit to our Strategic Partnership not to discuss troop withdrawal what complicates things is that your own welcome guest is heavily armed and has a tendency to how do you put this kill your other guests you call make this up americans kill and arabian general in iraq iran then shoots back a bunch of Ballistic Missiles in revenge out of iraq i mean these poor rocky guys theyve done nothing and everyones bombing them so you can understand if theyre a little sick of it all and point to the door we want to restart the civil war again among the shia we dont want this to happen we are not a battlefield between the usa and iran so whoever wants to heed the usa should do that outside of this country. Yet all of these troops must leave because they have turned iraq into a battlefield and its astonishing the americans are saying no we dont care that you voted for us to leave we wont and just in case that wasnt enough of a slap in the face actually going to call more of their for. And over there rock nato played and then you have any middle east youll call it they told me i said what a beautiful name nato personnel in the region tell you they supposed to us to be honest with you because this is an International Problem today and made to delegation is at the state department to discuss increasing netas role in the iraq situation is absurd it makes a joke a mockery of International Law and simple decency and as does anything absurd has the internet buzzing america is a force for good in the middle east and will start a civil war to prove you need our protection given military forces the against the wishes of the people who live there its called occupation when we said we wanted to bring you democracy we did not mean you cant use it to make your own decisions iraq asks u. S. Troops to leave the country but president pompei o refuses instead his state Department Issues a statement the 1st sentence reads america is a force for good in the middle east remember if you say i am so cool then youre not cool theres a lesson here i suppose you cant be friends with the superpower theyll call your friend patch on the head but when push comes to shove you are just another poor bombed out nation thats going to do as youre told at least try to Abdel Bari Atwan and political analysts Shabbir Razvi gave us their reaction to the increasing the messy clash. The pretext is you know without fighting for isis and there are we dont want them to come back but this is completely fabricated excuses to be honest because this is that. It is it is that i shammed it is there is that it is at all if you will simply and this is there and very completely you know i dont believe there is a chance of this i mean. Unless you have one bill to come back and one to climb as them this is the only the only way for those that say to come back. Im going to pull out. Here today and actually im going to lose the lucian. Problem this is all part of the ratcheting up trying to show that iran is the one line state iran is doing things which are not really in the interest of the public and you know usa is is is good for the world but really i would like to say that you know what mr. Trump was saying that they took every week but i think what would be a really good titan is that ari and me Islamic Republic middle east without the usa there then all of the problems that we have will disappear and then we could get to some truthful conversation and having a narrative which has some bases and a logical basis to any communication to miss chancellor Angela Merkels in moscow on an official visit after the break well bring you up to date on what topics are dominating discussions. Join me every thursday on the alex salmond show and ill be speaking to us on the world of politics sports business im sure business ill see you then. Come back to me chancellor Angela Merkel is in moscow for talks with blood in the putin on the meeting between the 2 leaders are still ongoing as we speak earlier merkel thanked the russian president for the invitation i think its always better to talk to each other and the bounty each other the chancellors visit was originally planned to be about the ukraine conflict and the crisis in libya now that its being overshadowed by the military escalation between america and iran as well as washingtons efforts to stop russias nord stream to gas pipeline to germany into other has more. Its difficult times that angular merkel arrives in moscow for what will be her 19th visit to russia as german chancellor certain to be up for discussion between herself and president Vladimir Putin are taking energy out of the Current Situation in the middle east and the standoff between iran and the United States and Getting Energy from russia into germany via the nord stream 2 gas pipeline. Chancellor merkel and president putin are in agreement when it comes to a deescalation of tension in the middle east mrs merkel Spokes Person stressing the need for cool heads this week its constant its important that all involved parties exercise restraint and turn away from the logic of escalation towards the logic of dialogue both the federal chancellery and the kremlin have voice their concern at the situation in the region with the government here in berlin sounding less than convinced by the justification given by washington for the assassination of a rainy and Major General because some stolen money. It was we saw the explanation of the u. S. For this strike but the information to comprehend the explanation is missing fostered a school year that mildred violence must only be the last resort. Germany and russia were both architects of the rainy a nuclear deal that now looks to be lying in tatters following 1st donald trump pulling the United States out of it unilaterally back in 2018 and just this week the iranian side saying theyre not going to live up to their end of the bargain following the killing of solomonic its bizarre its very concerning that iran is failing to meet is no longer meeting several of its obligations and what it has now announced is that it will no longer meet further obligations this is another wrong step in the wrong direction and naturally raises serious questions about the future of this agreement. When it comes to nord stream to a balancing act between washington and moscow will be required from t