U.S. And U.K. Intelligence Reportedly Suggest That A Bomb Might Have Brought Down Russian Plane That Killed All 224 Passengers; Russian Experts Say It Is Too Early To Conclude
All 224 passengers of a Russian jetliner died after it crashed in Egypt's Sinai peninsula on Saturday. According to reports, the Russian plane bound to St. Petersburg was carrying tourists from a popular resort in Egypt.
Among the passengers onboard the Russian plane was 214 Russians, three Ukrainians and seven crew staff. Also, 24 children were reportedly among the passengers of the jetliner.
Although they have yet to make a formal conclusion, the US and UK intelligence reportedly suggest that a bomb may have been the reason behind the plane crash in Egypt, as noted by BBC News Thursday.
UK Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond stated that the government had investigated the existing information and reached a conclusion that there was a "significant possibility" the Russian plane had been brought down by a bomb.
Following the incident, British flights out of Egypt's Sharm el-Sheikh were cancelled on Thursday, as per Hammond.
"We're spending today with the airlines, with the Egyptian authorities, putting in place short-term emergency measures that will allow us to screen everything going onto those planes, double-check those planes, so that we can be confident that they can fly back safely to the UK," he says.
Meanwhile, an unnamed US official revealed that "a bomb is a highly possible scenario" for the incident. He disclosed that they had arrived at a "tentative conclusion" that a member of the Islamic State (IS) may have planted a bomb on the Russian plane.
US President Barrack Obama also said that "there is a possibility that there was a bomb on board," adding that they are taking the prospect "very seriously."
"We're going to spend a lot of time just making sure our own investigators and own intelligence community find out what's going on before we make any definitive pronouncements," Obama says, as reported by The Washington Post Thursday. "But it's certainly possible that there was a bomb on board."
On the other hand, Russian experts said it is too early to conclude that the plane crash was caused by an explosive device. Airline company MetroJet also rejected the accusations that the crash was because of equipment malfunctions or crew error.
