Iran hit out at formal complaints by Ukraine, Canada, Britain and Sweden to a top aviation body and the International Court of Justice over Tehran's 2020 downing of Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752 which killed 176 people.

Seyed Ali Mousavi, the Iranian foreign ministry’s director-general of legal affairs described the move as "hasty and unjustified".

The shooting down of the plane in 2020 by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), he added, was "not intentional or deliberate."

The four countries' legal action over the tragedy with the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the world's top court is not new, but government statements on their quest timed with the five-year anniversary of the attack stoked Iranian ire.

Urging Iran to accept full responsibility for its actions, the four countries demanded reparations for the harm caused.