BAKU, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- Azerbaijan maintains a "firm and principled" position on the crash of an Azerbaijan Airlines passenger aircraft in December 2024, reaffirming that the incident was caused by a mistake on the part of the Russian military, Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov told journalists on Thursday.
"The plane was downed due to a mistake by the Russian Ministry of Defense. Our expectation is that the Russian side will take all necessary actions, provide a legal assessment of the incident, and issue compensation," said the foreign minister.
On Dec. 25, 2024, an Embraer 190 aircraft operated by Azerbaijan Airlines crashed near the Kazakh city of Aktau on its way from Baku to Russia's Grozny. Thirty-eight people among the 67 on board were killed in the crash.
Russian President Vladimir Putin later acknowledged that "technical malfunctions" of Russia's air defense system may have been a factor in the crash and pledged compensation during a meeting with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev in October 2025. ■