Russia has promised to punish those responsible for the deadly crash of an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger plane, the Azerbaijan prosecutor’s office announced on Monday.
Baku had already stated on Sunday that the plane had been shot at from Russia.
Aleksandr Bastrykin, the head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, has told Azerbaijan that “intensive measures have been taken to identify the culprits and hold them criminally accountable for their actions”.
The Azerbaijani prosecutor’s office added that Moscow will conduct a “full, thorough and objective” investigation into the crash. An investigation had also been launched earlier in Kazakhstan, where the plane crashed.
An Azerbaijan Airlines Embraer 190 crashed on Christmas Day near Aktau, a port city on the Caspian Sea in Kazakhstan. A total of 38 people were killed. On Sunday, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said the plane had been shot at from Russian territory.
Russian President Vladimir Putin had previously apologized to Aliyev for “the tragic incident in Russian airspace.” Putin also admitted that Russian air defences were active when the Azerbaijani plane tried to land, but he did not say whether air defences hit the plane.
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