Aliyev says he is sure that Russian “representatives” are responsible for the Azerbaijan Airlines crash

MADRID Jan. 6 (EUROPA PRESS) –

The president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, has this Monday directly blamed the “representatives” of Russia for the plane crash of the Azerbaijan Airlines flight that crashed on Christmas Day in the Kazakh city of Aktau.

“I can say with certainty that the fault that the Azerbaijani citizens died in this accident lies with the representatives of the Russian Federation,” Aliyev said in a meeting with relatives of the victims, to whom he promised to demand “justice.” for them.

“We demand punishment for those responsible, we demand total transparency and humane behavior,” said President Aliyev, who denounced the “attempts of Russian state bodies to silence the accident.”

In that sense, he has criticized that Russian “representatives” continue to defend “ridiculous versions” that cause “surprise” and “outrage,” according to the Azerbaijani news agency Azertag.

“If timely measures had been taken to close the airspace over the city of Grozny, if ground assistance rules had been observed and coordination had been established between the Russian Armed Forces and civil services, this tragedy could have been avoided. “, he assessed.

Aliyev has assured that once the black boxes are deciphered “everything will fall into place” and “the entire scenario of the tragedy will be known.”

On December 25, a plane from the Brazilian Embraer of Azerbaijan Airlines that was covering the Baku-Grozny route, crashed near the airport of the Kazakh city of Aktau, in unclear conditions. At least 38 people were killed and another 29 were injured, most of them seriously.