(The Hill) – Moscow on Thursday warned towards hypothesis that Russian air defenses can have led to the crash of an Azerbaijan Airways aircraft in Kazakhstan this week that killed 38 other folks.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov advised journalists that it used to be “vital to look forward to the tip of this probe” prior to casting any hypothesis.
“It will be improper to construct any hypotheses prior to the panel of inquiry items its conclusions,” Peskov mentioned, in line with the Russian state-run media outlet TASS. “In fact, we can not do this. No person must do it.”
Embraer-190, a passenger aircraft of Azerbaijan Airways, used to be headed from Baku to the town of Grozny within the Russian republic of Chechnya. It crashed on Wednesday in southwestern Kazakhstan’s town of Aktau at the Caspian Sea.
The aircraft used to be sporting 67 other folks from Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
The flight went down in a space the place Russia has incessantly activated air protection to take out Ukrainian drones within the battle towards Kyiv, fueling hypothesis that Russian forces can have by accident fired on the aircraft.
Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Delivery mentioned in a Telegram observation that investigators have been probing the incident in conjunction with officers from Azerbaijan, Brazilian professionals, the airline and the Brazilian-owned plane producer Embraer.
Azerbaijani information site Caliber reported {that a} initial investigation has discovered the flight used to be downed by means of a Pantsir-S Russian air protection gadget, whilst Russia extensively utilized digital war at the aircraft to disable it at the radar.
The opening additionally reported that Russian air protection methods have been activated on the time of the flight to take out Ukrainian drones.
International flight monitoring provider Flightradar24 mentioned in a publish at the social media platform X that the aircraft used to be uncovered to GPS jamming and spoofing close to Grozny.
An oxygen cylinder blew up on board the plane within the passenger cabin, Kazakhstan media reported, whilst Russian aviation officers have claimed a chook strike used to be accountable for the explosion.