Azerbaijan seeks justice: Russia's role in plane crash questioned
Azerbaijan plans to sue Russia over the downing of its Embraer E190 aircraft near Grozny if Moscow does not admit responsibility, reports "Azeri-Press" (APA). According to the agency, evidence is being gathered, and facts and testimonies are being collected in preparation for bringing the case to an international court.
"Azerbaijan's conditions and what it wants are clear, and they have been announced at the highest level. (...) Moscow must openly admit its guilt and take responsibility. Otherwise, Baku is ready for further steps," writes APA.
"Biased approach" of Moscow
The Azerbaijani authorities are outraged that even after the publication of the preliminary report by the Kazakh Ministry of Transport on the crash of the "Azerbaijan Airlines" (AZAL) aircraft on 25th December in Aktau, the Russian side continues to display a "biased and one-sided approach" to the incident. They believe this is evidenced by the position of Rosaviatsiya, which stated that the report does not contain conclusions about the causes of the event.
Rosaviatsiya noted that it was the crew who suggested a theory involving a collision with birds and the explosion of a gas cylinder onboard, and then made the decision to land in Aktau despite Russia offering airports in Makhachkala and Mineralnye Vody. Furthermore, Rosaviatsiya emphasised that Moscow had not received any "foreign objects" that damaged the plane for its own examination.
Simultaneously, the Russian agency's release omitted other details from the report, including that the air traffic controller at Grozny airport announced the closure of airspace under the "Carpet" plan after the aircraft had already been damaged. Rosaviatsiya also omitted that the report found no evidence of a bird strike or an explosion of an oxygen cylinder.
Moscow wants to sweep the matter under the rug
According to APA, in Azerbaijan, it is believed that Moscow wants to sweep the matter under the rug by blaming the aircraft crew, and intends to use a similar tactic as in the case of the Malaysian Boeing that was shot down over separatist-controlled Donbas in 2014 by the Russian "Buk" air defence system. 298 people died then, and the Russian Ministry of Defence accused Ukraine of the disaster, but the court in The Hague reached different conclusions.
Currently, Russian authorities argue that when the AZAL aircraft was hit, Chechnya was defending against an attack by Ukrainian drones. Meanwhile, Azerbaijan claims that the plane was fired upon by a Russian "Pantsir-S" air defence system.
A source in the Azerbaijani government informed Reuters that they have a fragment of the relevant missile, which was retrieved from the wreckage of the aircraft and identified during an international examination. Moreover, there is information that fire was opened from the area of a military unit in the Grozny town of Khankala.
The Embraer E190 aircraft of AZAL, flying from Baku to Grozny, crashed on 25th December in the Aktau region. Thirty-eight people died, and twenty-nine were injured.
The President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, blamed Russia for the disaster and demanded that the perpetrators be punished. He also expressed outrage at Moscow's attempts to "cover up the case" and hide the fact of the aircraft being fired upon by the Russian air defence, using "absurd theories" of a bird collision and a gas cylinder explosion on board.
