Tehran Court to accept Mina incident lawsuits
Country’s attorney-general has told reporters all government authorities should address the rights of families of Mina incident victims.
Hojjatoleslam Ebrahim Raeisi who was speaking to the press after a session specially met to examine the legal aspects of the Mina incident on Wednesday, said that several meetings had collected the expert advice and comments of judges of country’s Supreme Court and international law experts as well on the Mina incident; “today’s session brought together engaged authorities, inter alia, presidential deputy for legal affairs, foreign ministry, Hajj and Pilgrimage Organization, and other responsible bodies; foreign ministry is definitely the pioneer of international addressing of the issue; however, Saudi government should know that the establishment of a truth-finding committee has our support yet, and we believe that it is a necessity,” Raeisi told reporters.
“The footages recorded from Mina incident should be given to Iran and other countries whose Hajj pilgrims have been killed to rule out the possibility that even a tinge of evidence remains outside of the investigations; the truth-finding committee would be of great help on this issue; Saudis on the other hand should understand that the passing of the time will add to our resolve to address Mina incident, and that it would not be forgotten any time soon,” he emphasized.
“During the first two or three days of the incident, I sent a letter to Saudi attorney-general demanding that they investigate all aspects of the issue, and file lawsuits against possible perpetrators, albeit with little hope that Saudi officials have the necessary will to do that,” said the attorney-general, “we would sue Saudi government in international criminal courts should Saudis failed to effectively address the issue of paying recompenses for the families of the victims and turn a blind eye to demands that the perpetrators be tried,” he added.
“The UN has a duty to bring the issue of security and safety of Hajj pilgrims to its Security Council agenda; we examined similar cases where the UN had in the past established truth-finding committee; we also examined possible roles to be played by ICC (International Criminal Court) and ICJ (International Court of Justice); the internaitola community is accountable in Mina incident,” Raeisi told reporters, highlighting the role of foreign ministry as the pioneer body in addressing the issue.
“We expect to see that Saudi Arabia seriously addresses the issue and officially communicates the results of probable trial and hearing sessions; however, with few days since the incident, no indication would signal to us that Saudi Arabian officials actually have that seriousness we expected,” he lamented.
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