The Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) Aerospace Force Commander Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh on Saturday accepted all responsibility for last Wednesday's plane crash in Tehran.

Iran Press/Iran news: "For more than a week, the region's conditions and the likelihood of conflict have been unprecedented since the beginning of the revolution," Hajizadeh said before reporters.

"The forces on both sides were on the highest level of readiness for any attack, especially as the Americans had announced that they would hit 52 cultural spots in Iran. So all of Iran's offensive and defensive units were in a state of high alert," he added.

"What we did during the night of the incident was to prepare for war, and the highest level of alert was communicated to all personnel through the integrated defense network," Hajizadeh went on to say, adding, "Under these circumstances, a number of defensive systems were added to the Tehran Defense Ring. That is, the accident occurred by the first system deployed in western part of Tehran."

Hajizadeh added, "During recent days, officials with Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization insisted that the plane had not been brought down by a missile as no state organization or officials were allowed to have access to the details of the plane crash. Thus officials at the Civil Aviation Organization were blameless since they genuinely did not know what had happened."

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To be updated ...