Azerbaijani and US officials suggest plane that crashed may have been hit by weapons fire

Russian air defence systems may have brought down an Azerbaijani airliner this week, a US official said on Friday after an Azerbaijani minister also suggested the plane was hit by a weapon, citing expert analysis and survivor accounts.

Friday’s assessments by Rashan Nabiyev and White House National Security spokesman John Kirby echoed those made by outside aviation experts who blamed the crash on Russian air defence systems responding to a Ukrainian attack.

These statements raised pressure on Russia, where officials said a drone attack was under way in the region where the Azerbaijan Airlines flight was heading for a landing. They did not address statements blaming air defences.

Kirby told reporters on Friday that the US has “seen some early indications that would certainly point to the possibility that this jet was brought down by Russian air defence systems”, but refused to elaborate, citing a continuing investigation.

Pressed on whether the US has intelligence that helped lead to that conclusion, or was simply relying on informed speculation from experts based on visual assessments of the crash, Kirby characterised the short answer as “yes” but said he would “leave it at that”, without providing further details.

The plane was flying from Azerbaijan’s capital of Baku to Grozny, the regional capital of the Russian republic of Chechnya, on Wednesday when it turned towards Kazakhstan and crashed while making an attempt to land. The crash killed 38 people and left all 29 survivors injured.