Ilham Aliyev accuses Russia of firing on the Azerbaijan Airways plane and attempting to cowl up the reason for the catastrophe.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has referred to as on Russia to “admit its guilt” for unintentionally taking pictures down an Azerbaijani airliner, an incident that killed 38 folks and injured 29.
Azerbaijan Airways Flight 8432 crashed close to the town of Aktau, Kazakhstan, on Wednesday whereas on its method to Grozny, the capital of the Chechnya area in southern Russia.
“We will say with full readability that the airplane was shot down by Russia,” Aliyev instructed Azerbaijani state tv on Sunday. “We aren’t saying that it was completed deliberately, however it was completed.”
He defined that the airliner was struck by floor hearth over Russia and “rendered uncontrollable by digital warfare”, forcing it off beam earlier than it tried an emergency touchdown and crashed. Initially, the Kremlin mentioned the crash occurred after the Embraer 190 plane hit a flock of birds, however mounting proof instructed that an antiaircraft missile was the trigger.
Aliyev accused Russia of attempting to “hush up” the difficulty for a number of days, saying he was “upset and stunned” by the conflicting accounts put ahead by Russian officers. “Sadly, for the primary three days, we heard nothing from Russia besides delirious variations,” he mentioned.
Final week, a Kazakh aviation security skilled instructed Al Jazeera on the situation of anonymity that “no fowl can ever trigger such harm”. “It’s absurd and prison to assert such a factor,” the skilled mentioned.
Amid the backlash, Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday apologised to Aliyev for the “tragic incident” in Russian airspace, saying Russian air defences had engaged Ukrainian assault drones.
A Kremlin assertion didn’t say Russia had shot down the airplane, solely noting a prison case had been opened.
Aliyev urged Moscow to subject a public apology to his nation, saying Baku had made official “calls for” to Russia two days in the past.
“First, the Russian facet should apologise to Azerbaijan. Second, it should acknowledge its guilt. Third, these accountable have to be punished, dropped at prison duty and compensation have to be paid to the Azerbaijani state in addition to to the injured passengers and crew members. These are our situations,” he mentioned, including that the primary demand had already been addressed with Putin’s apology.
Putin and Aliyev spoke by phone name once more on Sunday, the Kremlin mentioned with out giving particulars. The Kremlin has already introduced a joint investigation into the crash with Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.
