Vladimir Putin has admitted Russia’s air defences were responsible for shooting down an Azerbaijani passenger jet in December, killing 38 people.
The Russian president said missiles fired by Russian air defences to target a Ukrainian drone detonated near the Azerbaijani Airlines plane, which was flying from Baku, as it prepared to land in Grozny, the regional capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya, on Christmas day last year.
“The two missiles that were launched did not hit the plane directly; if that had happened, it would have crashed on the spot, but they exploded, perhaps as a self-destruction measure, a few metres away, about 10m,” Mr Putin said.
“And so the damage was caused, mainly not by the warheads, but most likely by the debris from the missiles themselves. That is why the pilot perceived it as a collision with a flock of birds, which he reported to Russian air traffic controllers, and all this is recorded in the so-called ‘black boxes’.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Speaking at a meeting with Azerbaijan‘s President Ilham Aliyev in Tajikistan’s capital, Dushanbe, Mr Putin pledged to punish those responsible and compensate the victims.
“It is our duty,” he said, “to give an objective assessment of everything that happened and to identify the true causes.”
Mr Putin warned it would “probably take some more time” to fully investigate the cause of the crash.
Read more from Sky News:
Could Trump win the Nobel Peace Prize?
Sky News joins NATO air patrol designed to deter Russia
Azerbaijani authorities had said the jet was accidentally hit by fire from Russian air defences.
It then tried to land in western Kazakhstan, where it crashed, killing 38 of the 67 people on board.
Days later, Mr Putin apologised to Mr Aliyev for what he called a “tragic accident”, but stopped short of taking responsibility.
Be the first to get Breaking News
Install the Sky News app for free
Mr Aliyev criticised Moscow for trying to “hush up” the incident.
But on Thursday, he thanked Mr Putin for personally monitoring the progress of the investigation.
“I would like to express my gratitude once again for the fact that you deemed it necessary to highlight this issue at our meeting,” Mr Aliyev told Mr Putin.
Follow our channel and never miss an update
It is the second deadly aviation incident linked to the Kremlin’s conflict in Ukraine, after Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down by a Russian missile in 2014, killing all 298 people aboard.
