WorthyNews: US Suggests Azerbaijan Airlines Plane Was Downed by Russian Air Defense

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By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News

WASHINGTON/MOSCOW/BUDAPEST (Worthy News) – The United States said Friday that it has evidence suggesting Russian air defense systems may have shot down the Azerbaijan Airlines plane that crashed in Kazakhstan this week.

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said the evidence went beyond circulated images of the damaged aircraft. “We have seen some early indications that would certainly point to the possibility that this jet was brought down by Russian air defense systems,” he added.

The White House announced that Washington offered its assistance in investigating the incident. “An investigation is currently underway involving Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan,” Kirby said. “We have offered our assistance with that investigation, should they need it.”

The Azerbaijani government suggested that the plane was shot down. “The investigation will determine what type of weapon caused the external impact,” explained Azerbaijan’s Minister of Transport, Rashad Nabiyev, in published remarks. The crash on Wednesday claimed the lives of 38 of the 67 passengers onboard.

Experts believe the damage to the wreckage indicates that the Azerbaijan Airlines plane was struck from the outside. Moscow said it wants to await the investigation’s outcome.

Survivors of the crash in Kazakhstan also reported hearing explosions before the aircraft went down. “Witnesses stated they heard the sound of an explosion outside, followed by the plane being hit by something,” said Nabiyev, without specifying who might have fired the weapon.

At the time of the crash on Christmas Day morning, Ukrainian drones were reportedly targeting the region where the plane was scheduled to land.

The investigation is closely followed in the Netherlands, where many lives were devastated when Russian-backed forces shot down a scheduled passenger flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur in July 2014, officials said

All 283 passengers, most of them Dutch citizens, and 15 crew were killed. Contact with the aircraft, a Boeing 777-200ER, was lost when it was about 50 kilometers (31 miles) from the Ukraine–Russia border.

The shoot-down of flight MH17 occurred during the war in Ukraine’s eastern Donbas region over territory controlled by Russian separatist forces.

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