TEHRAN – Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met on Friday on the sidelines of the 56th Munich Security Conference (MSC).

Zarif also met with Canadian Foreign Minister François-Philippe Champagne.

According to website of Canada’s Foreign Ministry, the two agreed to remain in close touch over the issue of the Ukrainian plane crash in January.

“The two also discussed the download and analysis of PS752’s black boxes. Minister Champagne reiterated that the preferred option of the International Coordination and Response Group is for Iran to make use of the facilities offered by France, which possesses the technical capacity to perform this work. Minister Champagne also stressed the importance of a fair and equitable compensation settlement for the families of the victims, based on international standards,” the website reported.

A Ukrainian passenger plane, with 176 people aboard, was mistakenly downed on January 8 near Tehran by air defense system.

The victims of the crash included 82 Iranians, 63 Iranian-Canadians, 11 Ukrainians, 10 Swedes, four Afghans, three Germans, and three British nationals.

Zarif was scheduled to meet with Pekka Haavisto, the foreign minister of Finland, on the sidelines of the conference.

The MSC forum opened on Friday and is scheduled to end on Sunday. It is an annual conference on international security policy that has taken place in Munich, Bavaria since 1963.

Over the past four decades the Munich Security Conference has become the most important independent forum for the exchange of views by international security policy decision-makers.

NA/PA