The leader of Azerbaijan criticized the Russian response to the crash of a passenger jet that Azerbaijani officials said had most likely been hit by Russian air defenses.

Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev has called on Russia to accept blame for a plane crash on Christmas Day that killed 38 people. The plane is thought to have come under fire from Russian air defence systems as it tried to land in Chechnya before being diverted to Kazakhstan, where it crashed.

Azerbaijani authorities believe the Azerbaijan Airlines plane that crashed in Kazakhstan, killing 38 people, was shot by a Russian anti-aircraft missile, multiple reports said on Thursday. The Turkish state news agency Anadolu cited anonymous senior state officials in Azerbaijan as saying the plane was hit by a missile on Wednesday.