BAKU – With Azerbaijan in mourning this week over the Christmas Day plane crash that claimed 38 lives, political scientist Farhad Mammadov’s mind raced back to November 2020.
Then, on the last day of the war between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the Nagorno-Karabakh region, Azerbaijan shot down a Russian helicopter near its border, while it was in Armenian airspace.
“Immediately, the president of Azerbaijan called the president of Russia, took the blame for himself, for the country, brought an apology, and then there was the punishment of the guilty and the payment of compensation,” said Mammadov, who is the director of the Baku-based Center for Studies of the South Caucasus.
Four years later, the roles have reversed — almost.
On December 25, Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 8243 took off from Baku bound for Grozny in Chechnya, with 67 passengers and crew onboard. As the plane neared Grozny in Russian airspace, it appeared to have come under fire from the ground and changed course east, crashing near Aktau in western Kazakhstan. Only 29 people survived.
Although Russian officials at first speculated that the plane hit a flock of birds or an oxygen tank onboard exploded, the damage appeared consistent with that from surface-to-air missiles used by the Russian air defense. Last Saturday, Russian President Vladimir Putin apologised for the “tragic incident” but did not directly take responsibility on Russia’s behalf, claiming Ukrainian drones were in the area.
However, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has demanded that Russia formally accept responsibility and pay compensation to the survivors — reflecting the anger in Azerbaijan over Moscow’s handling of the catastrophe, and the expectation that Putin be as upfront about what happened as Aliyev was in 2020.
“Azerbaijan is expecting the same now, which we have not seen yet,” said Mammadov. “And if the Russian side has chosen the path of partial apology, then we will expect subsequent apologies, punishments and compensations at the subsequent stages of the investigation into the ongoing case.”
For many in Azerbaijan, it is not just a question of what hit the plane, but how Russia responded to the emergency.
“What makes this situation even more appalling is what happened after the plane was shot down,” Leyla, a native of Baku, told Al Jazeera. “Landing permission in Russian territory was denied. This is the most gruesome part of the incident and something people cannot forgive.”
Azerbaijani officials have claimed that the pilots were denied emergency landing permission in Russia, forcing them to change course to Aktau, across the Caspian Sea.
“If the plane had been allowed to land in Russia after the mistake was realised, perhaps those lives could have been saved. Instead, the plane was sent to Kazakhstan, a decision made by heartless, incompetent individuals,” Leyla added. “This lack of humanity and accountability is what angers and devastates people the most.”
But could the fate of Flight 8243 also damage Russia’s relations with Azerbaijan?
As a former Soviet republic, relations between oil-rich Azerbaijan and its enormous northern neighbour have been complicated – but, unlike for example, the Baltics, not completely hostile.
Azerbaijan briefly gained independence following the Russian Empire’s collapse at the end of the First World War. But in 1920, the Red Army invaded, bringing Azerbaijan back under Moscow’s wing for the next seven decades. (Al Jazeera)
Photo: People mourn at the grave of flight attendant Hokume Aliyeva during a funeral of the crew members of the Azerbaijan Airlines Embraer 190 killed in a deadly plane crash in Kazakhstan this week, at the II Alley of Honor in Baku. (AP)
