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.

An investigation into the deadly crash of an Azerbaijan Airlines flight in Kazakhstan earlier this week came after the passenger plane experienced “physical and technical external interference,” the carrier said on Friday.

It was Christmas Day when a passenger plane crashed in western Kazakhstan, near the city of Aktau. Out of 67 people on board, 38 died and