“As previously mentioned, ten defendants in this case were summoned to the court due to culpability and negligence, and the case was sent to the court after an indictment was issued,” FNA quoted an informed source as saying on Sunday.

“Immediately after sending the case to the court, the case was studied by the presiding judge and several meetings were held with the [victims’] close relatives and their lawyers for initial preparations before the court hearing,” the source added.

The Ukrainian plane was shot down with 176 people aboard on January 8, 2020, by Iran’s air defenses, which mistook the aircraft for a military target amid military tensions between Tehran and Washington following the US assassination of Iran’s Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani in Iraq days earlier.

Hours before the tragedy happened, Iran had launched a retaliatory missile strike against a US-run base in western Iraq and then put the country’s air defenses on high alert due to increased American aerial activity in the aftermath of the strike.

Iran acknowledged days later that the mismanagement of an air defense unit’s radar system by its operator was the key human error that led to the accident.

Tehran has promised that all those culpable in the incident will face trial and said it has allocated 200 million Euros for compensation of the survivors.

In relevant remarks in April, Spokesman of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Keivan Khosravi censured efforts made to politicize the Ukrainian plane crash, calling the move as regrettable and inhumane.

Khosravi said the Ukrainian officials’ allegations on shooting down of a passenger plane over Iran’s sky are unconstructive, as they are trying to politicize the case.

He described efforts made to take political advantage “of the sentiments of scores of bereaved families” as “regrettable and inhuman,” adding that various independent expert groups have probed into all the existing hypotheses on the event.

“Unfortunately, Ukrainian officials are trying to ascribe false allegations to Iranian officials in order to politicize this case,” the spokesman noted.

“Sending the plane’s black boxes to France to decode their contents is the most important reason that proves Iran’s transparency and honesty in its effort to bring to light all details about this incident,” Khosravi said.

“We have accepted all demands put forth by Ukrainian government, which at times went beyond what was necessary under usual circumstances, so that, there would remain no dark corner in the efforts made to shed light on the truth in this incident,” he added.