NEWS- Authorities in Kazakhstan have confirmed that at least 38 people are reported to have died after the passenger Azerbaijan Airlines plane with 67 people on board crashed near the city of Aktau in Kazakhstan.
Kazakhstan’s Deputy Prime Minister Kanat Bozumbayev confirmed that the aircraft was en route from the Azerbaijani capital of Baku to the Russian city of Grozny in the North Caucasus when it crashed.
The plane has 62 passengers and five crew members on board and crashed yesterday after it was forced to make an emergency landing about three kilometres (1.8 miles) from Aktau Airport Prime Minister Bozumbayev clarified.
“The situation is not very good, 38 dead,” Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted Kazakhstan’s Deputy Prime Minister Kanat Bozumbayev as saying.
Azerbaijan’s Prosecutor General’s office earlier said 32 of the 67 people on board had survived.
“We cannot disclose any investigation results at this time. All possible scenarios are being examined, and the necessary expert analyses are underway,” the statement indicated.
Azerbaijan Airlines said it was suspending all its flights from Baku to Russia’s Chechnya region until the investigation is concluded and according to the Russian state news agency, passengers on the plane included citizens from Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
