Russian President Vladimir Putin apologized to the President of Azerbaijan for the crash of the civilian airliner that killed 38 folks, the Kremlin mentioned Saturday.
“Vladimir Putin apologized for the truth that the tragic incident occurred in Russian airspace,” the Kremlin mentioned.
The airliner had “repeatedly tried to land” on the Grozny airport, Putin advised Ilham Aliyev, which on the time was being “attacked by Ukrainian fight drones.”
Russian air protection methods “repelled these assaults,” Putin mentioned.
He didn’t say if the airplane was hit by Russian air defenses however Kremlin mentioned that an investigation was underway and civilian and army specialists have been being interrogated.
Two U.S. army officers advised NBC News on Friday that the airplane might have been hit by Russian missiles, saying that they had intelligence indicating that Russians might have misidentified the airplane and shot it down.
The intelligence prompt that Russians believed the airliner was a drone, partly due to irregular flight sample, the officers mentioned.
The Azerbaijan Airlines airplane crash landed close to town of Aktau in Kazakhstan on Christmas day, killing 38 of the 67 on board.
The Embraer 190 skilled “bodily and technical exterior interference,” the service mentioned Friday, whereas the airplane was en route from the Azerbaijan capital Baku, to Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, Russia.