Russians who reviewed the transcript of the crew's conversations from the Baku-Grozny flight themselves admit that the air crash was caused by their air defense systems (ADS), according to Andriy Kovalenko,

Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev said Russia is behind the Christmas Day crash of an Azerbaijan Airlines plane in Kazakhstan, which killed 38 of the 67 people aboard. The motives of the incident remain unclear.

Russian President Vladimir Putin apologized to his Azerbaijani counterpart for what he called a "tragic incident" following the crash of an airliner.

Azerbaijani President said Sunday that the plane that crashed in Kazakhstan on Wednesday "was damaged from outside on Russian territory."

Russia has published a festive video of Santa Claus becoming a victim of Russian air defence against the backdrop of the tragic crash of an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger plane in Grozny, with growing evidence pointing to Russian air defence as the cause.

On 25 December, 38 people died when an Azerbaijan Airlines flight, which had been due to land in Russia, crash-landed in Kazakhstan. The circumstances around the crash remain unclear, but limited evidence so far suggests it may have been damaged by missiles fired by a Russian air-defence system as it tried to land in Chechnya.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on Sunday demanded that Russia admit that it fired at an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger jet before it crashed, accusing Moscow of initially trying to cover up the cause of the fatal disaster.

Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has accused Russia of accidentally shooting down an airliner on Christmas Day in a disaster that killed 38 people, and covering up the cause.