Downing the Ukraine Airlines passenger plane and killing all 176 on board was the sequel to shooting mid-November protesters in the head, a veteran former ally of the Islamic Republic Supreme Leader said in a statement on Tuesday, January 14.

The blood money and compensation for the victims of the doomed flight should be the dismissal of the Islamic Republic Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the former revolutionary Abolfazl Qadyani (Ghadiani) asserted.

The three-year-old Boeing 737-800, operated by Ukraine International Airlines, took off from Tehran's Imam Khomeini international airport at 6.12 am local time on Wednesday, January 8, heading for Kyiv.

A few minutes later, two missiles were fired at the plane fatally damaging the aircraft which crashed near the Iranian capital city, Tehran.

Victims of the crash included 82 Iranians, 63 Canadians, 11 Ukrainians, 10 Swedes, four Afghans, three Germans, and three Britons.

For three days, the Islamic Republic authorities vehemently insisted that technical failure caused the crash.

Ultimately, under internal and international pressure, the country's Joint Chief of Staff Headquarters admitted that an Islamic Revolution Guards Corps missile had downed the plane.

The 73-year-old politician and a senior member of the Mojahedin of the Islamic Revolution of Iran Organization (MIRIO), Qadyani has lambasted the authorities for hiding the truth and keeping people in the dark.

Qadyani lives in Iran but has been willing to take the risk to attack Khamenei directly. He was taken to court in 2019 and convicted to three years in prison for his criticism, but the regime decided not to put him in jail. He was ordered to read three pro-revolution and Islamic Republic books, one praising Khamenei, and copying them by hand. Hand copying texts is considered a punishment in Iranian elementary schools for pupils who disrupt the classroom.

His conviction was for an open letter Qadyani wrote in February 2019, describing Khamenei as a religious "dictator."

Comparing the Islamic Republic's publicity to the Nazis' propaganda orchestrated by Joseph Goebbels, the veteran revolutionary has asserted that "organized and systematic deception and lying" is an "integral part of the regime based on religious dictatorship."

Indiscriminately killing protesters and downing passenger planes reveal the fact that the Islamic Republic establishment cannot be reformed, Qadyani notes in his latest statement, adding "Every catastrophe in the country highlights the inefficiency and repressive nature of the leaders who mismanage Iran today.

Once again, Qadyani has called for holding a referendum to decide Iran's political future.

Responding to the critics who believe holding a referendum in Iran is impossible, Qadyani insists, "If people want, and referendum turns into public demand, we can hold one."