MOSCOW/BAKU - President Vladimir Putin on Saturday apologized to Azerbaijan 's leader for what the Kremlin called a 'tragic incident' over Russia in which an Azerbaijan Airlines plane crash ed after Russia n air defenses were fired against Ukrainian drones.
The extremely rare publicized apology from Putin was the closest Moscow had come to accepting some blame for Wednesday's disaster, although the Kremlin statement did not say Russia had shot down the plane, only noting that a criminal case had been opened.Flight J2-8243, en route from Baku to the Chechen capital Grozny, crash-landed on Wednesday near Aktau in Kazakhstan after diverting from southern Russia, where Ukrainian drones were reported to be attacking several cities. At least 38 people were killed.Four sources with knowledge of the preliminary findings of Azerbaijan's investigation told Reuters on Thursday that Russian air defenses had mistakenly shot the airliner down. Passengers said they heard a loud bang outside the plane.Putin called President Ilham Aliyev and 'apologized for the tragic incident that occurred in Russian airspace and once again expressed his deep and sincere condolences to the families of the victims and wished a speedy recovery to the injured,' the Kremlin said.'At that time, Grozny, Mozdok and Vladikavkaz were being attacked by Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles, and Russian air defense systems repelled these attacks.'The Kremlin said 'civilian and military specialists' were being questioned.Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy also said he had called Aliyev to offer condolences, and in his statement on the X platform demanded that Russia provide 'clear explanations'.Azerbaijan for its part said Aliyev had noted to Putin that the plane had been 'subjected to external physical and technical interference in Russian airspace, resulting in a complete loss of control and redirection to the Kazakh city of Aktau
Russia Azerbaijan Plane Crash Ukrainian Drones Apologies
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