Russian President Vladimir Putin has admitted that his country’s air defences were responsible for shooting down an Azerbaijan Airlines plane that crashed in Kazakhstan on Christmas Day, killing 38.
Putin made the statement at a meeting with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliev in Tajikistan’s capital of Dushanbe on Thursday. Both men are attending a summit of the former Soviet nations.
“Of course, everything that is required in such tragic cases will be done by the Russian side on compensation and a legal assessment of all official things will be given,” Putin said.
“It is our duty, I repeat once again … to give an objective assessment of everything that happened and to identify the true causes.”
Video footage taken on Thursday showed Putin and Aliyev shaking hands and smiling before the meeting, where the Russian leader spoke about the crash.
Putin said the missiles fired by Russian air defences to target a Ukrainian drone exploded near the Azerbaijan Airlines plane flying from Baku as it was preparing to land in Grozny, the regional capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya.
Ukrainian drones have regularly struck deep inside Russia.
Until now, Putin had avoided saying that Russia had shot the plane down, but had apologised for the ‘tragic incident’ in Russian airspace.
Aliyev, meanwhile, criticised Moscow for trying to “hush up” the incident.
Chechen air defences were prepared for incoming Ukrainian drones at the time of the incident.
Azerbaijani government officials told Euronews immediately after the crash that there had been drone activity above Grozny.
They said Flight J2-8243 was accidentally hit by fire from Russian air defences on December 25, then tried to land before crashing near Aktau airport.
The pilots had asked for help from different airports in Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, but were denied access to Grozny, officially due to “fog”.
The plane crashed near Aktau after crossing the Caspian Sea. Azerbaijan said it had been hit by “external interference” before coming down.
The crash remained under close investigation for months after a preliminary report found fragments from “foreign metal objects” inside the plane.
It said that there was damage to the plane, including on its stabilisers, hydraulics and trim systems.
