Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev alleged on Sunday that final week’s passenger aircraft crash, which killed 38 individuals, was brought on by floor hearth in Russia, accusing some Russian officers of concealing the reality concerning the incident.
President Vladimir Putin on Saturday apologized to Aliyev for Wednesday’s “tragic incident” in Russian airspace involving the aircraft after Russian air defenses engaged Ukrainian assault drones.
A Kremlin assertion didn’t say Russia had shot down the aircraft, solely noting a legal case had been opened.
“Our plane was shot down by accident,” Aliyev advised state tv Sunday, including that the aircraft had come beneath some type of digital jamming and had then been shot at whereas it was approaching the southern Russian metropolis of Grozny.
“Unfortunately, in the first three days we heard only absurd versions from Russia,” Aliyev stated, citing statements in Russia that attributed the crash to birds or the explosion of some type of fuel cylinder.
“We witnessed clear attempts to cover up the matter,” stated the Azerbaijani chief, who has shut ties to Russia and was educated at considered one of Moscow’s high universities.
Aliyev stated he wished Russia to simply accept it was responsible of downing the aircraft and punish these chargeable for fatally damaging the plane.
Azerbaijan Airlines Flight J2-8243 crashed Wednesday in a ball of fireplace close to town of Aktau in Kazakhstan after diverting from southern Russia the place Ukrainian drones have been attacking a number of cities.
The extraordinarily uncommon publicized apology from Putin on Saturday is the closest Moscow has come to accepting some blame for the catastrophe.
Four sources with information of the preliminary findings of Azerbaijan’s investigation into the catastrophe advised Reuters on Thursday that Russian air defenses had mistakenly shot it down.
Burials
Earlier Sunday, Azerbaijan paid tribute to the pilots and passengers of the aircraft.
Captain Igor Kshnyakin and co-pilot Alexander Kalyaninov, each ethnic Russians with Azerbaijan citizenship, and Hokuma Aliyeva, a flight attendant, got full honors at a ceremony on the Alley of Honor in central Baku attended by Aliyev and his spouse, Mehriban.
The pilots have been lauded in Azerbaijan for touchdown in a manner that allowed 29 individuals to outlive however led to their very own deaths.
The Embraer passenger jet had flown from Azerbaijan’s capital Baku to Grozny, in Russia’s southern Chechnya area, earlier than veering off a whole lot of miles throughout the Caspian Sea.
Azerbaijan’s presidential workplace stated that after the yet-to-be-explained incident over Russian airspace, the pilots battled to regulate the aircraft – desperately looking for a touchdown spot.
With holes within the fuselage, some crew injured, passengers praying for his or her lives in a de-pressurised cabin and the aircraft spiraling uncontrolled, the pilots flew throughout the Caspian Sea in direction of their loss of life in a crash touchdown.
“Only through the courage and professionalism of the pilots was an emergency landing successfully carried out,” Azerbaijan’s presidential workplace stated.
The Alley of Honor is Azerbaijan’s most sacred fashionable burial floor – the place outstanding politicians, poets and scientists are laid to relaxation, together with Heydar Aliyev, the late father of the present president.
Captain Kshnyakin’s daughter, Anastasia Kshnyakina, stated her father was a devoted pilot who took his obligations to his passengers extraordinarily critically.
“My father always said: when I take off, I am responsible not only for my life, but also for the lives of all passengers and crew members,” Kshnyakina stated.
“With his last flight, he proved what a true hero should be.”
Source: www.dailysabah.com