Following the tragic crash of a plane in Kazakhstan that killed 38 people, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev accused Russia of seeking to conceal the real cause of this disaster. The Azerbaijan Airlines plane, which was reportedly damaged by the ground fire while flying over Russian territory, has become a source of a very charged exchange of words between Baku and Moscow.
President Aliyev expressed his deep regret that some circles in Russia have allegedly tried to cover up the facts of the accident in which 67 passengers were involved. On state television, he accused Moscow of spreading “myths” about what happened.
“The facts show that the Azerbaijani civilian airplane was hit by an extraneous object near Grozny, whereupon control over it was nearly lost,” Aliyev said in a televised address, according to the words carried by the state news agency Azertag. He further revealed that electronic warfare systems had interfered with the operations of the aircraft and that ground fire damaged the tail.
While emphasizing that the incident was not an intentional act of terror, Aliyev asked Russia to acknowledge its responsibility and apologize before Azerbaijan, which he underlined was a friendly country. “The first urgent steps needed were an acknowledgment of guilt and public revelation of the facts,” he said.
The Russian President, Vladimir Putin, extended a kind of “apology” to Aliyev during a phone call – describing the crash as a “tragic incident”. However, he stopped short of confirming that Russian fire had hit the plane. He did admit that Russian air defense systems were activated when the passenger aircraft was approaching for landing in Grozny.
Earlier, Azerbaijan’s Transport Minister Rashad Nabiyev said the plane had been subjected to “external interference” as it flew over Chechnya, and that all survivors reported hearing three blasts during the flight.
After the call between Putin and Aliyev, Baku’s presidency repeated its conviction that the plane was hit while in Russian airspace and called for a full investigation to punish those responsible.
