A Russian Il-76 military transport plane carrying 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war crashed in the Belgorod region bordering Ukraine on Wednesday, and Russian officials were quick to accuse kyiv of shooting down the plane. . Ukraine did not immediately react to the disaster.
No one survived the crash of a Russian military plane on Wednesday in the Belgorod region, bordering Ukraine, the local governor said, while the plane was carrying 74 people, including 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war. “All people on board were killed,” Vyacheslav Gladkov said on Telegram. According to the Russian Defense Ministry, 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war, six crew members and three attendants were on the plane.
The Belgorod region is very regularly targeted by missile fire
Images circulating on social networks show a device falling almost steeply, before a large explosion, accompanied by flames and black smoke. The Russian ministry has given no indication at this stage as to the fate of the occupants of the plane, which, according to several Russian media, crashed near the village of Yablonovo, 45 kilometers from the border with Ukraine.
The Belgorod region is very regularly targeted by Ukrainian missile and drone fire due to its proximity to the border. Russia has continued to bomb Ukraine since it launched its assault in February 2022.
Moscow accuses kyiv
Questioned during his daily press briefing, the Kremlin spokesperson did not comment, noting the too “recent” nature of the information. “We will clarify all that,” he nevertheless assured.
The President of the Russian Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, did not wait to accuse Kiev, just a few minutes after the announcement of the disaster, of having shot down the plane transporting these prisoners with a view, according to Moscow, to a exchange. “They killed their own soldiers in the air. Their mothers, their children were waiting for them,” he proclaimed in the chamber. “They shot down our pilots who were carrying out a humanitarian mission (…) with American and German missiles,” he continued.
Another deputy, chairman of the Defense Committee in the Duma, also made these accusations. “Ukrainian leaders were fully aware of the upcoming exchange and were informed of how the prisoners would be delivered,” Andrei Kartapolov said, according to Russian media.
The United States and Germany targeted
“But the Il-76 plane was shot down by three missiles from a Patriot or IRIS-T surface-to-air missile system, made in Germany, experts will sort things out,” he said.
Mr. Volodin immediately called on his fellow deputies to vote on a resolution addressed to the United States and Germany because these countries have supplied ground-to-air systems to Ukraine. In July 2022, Russians and Ukrainians had already accused each other of the deadly bombing of a prison housing Ukrainian prisoners in Olenivka, a village in eastern Ukraine occupied by Russia.
Since the start of its assault on Ukraine, Russia has experienced several air disasters involving army aircraft. Ukraine has destroyed Russian aircraft in the past. It thus claimed last week to have shot down an A-50 spy plane (Russian equivalent of Western AWACS) and destroyed an Il-22 command plane.
In Russia, the plane carrying the leader of the Wagner armed group, Yevgeni Prigozhin, crashed in August 2023 during a flight between Moscow and St. Petersburg, killing him and his main lieutenants a few weeks after an abortive mutiny that had enraged Vladimir Putin. Russian authorities have denied any involvement, saying the plane may have crashed because its passengers detonated a grenade on board.
In October 2022, a Su-34 fighter bomber crashed into a building in the city of Yeïsk, on the Russian coast of the Sea of Azov, killing 15 people.