A Russian military transport plane has crashed in Syria killing all 39 people on board, sharply raising the death toll from Moscow’s intervention in the Syrian war.
Russian news agencies quoted the defence ministry as saying the plane, a Soviet-designed An-26, crashed at Russia’s Hmeymim airbase in Latakia province and initial information suggested a technical fault may have been the cause. All 39 dead were members of the Russian armed forces.
Military officials reportedly said the aircraft had not been brought down by enemy fire. Russian state TV said the plane came down around 500 metres short of the runway at Hmeymim.
Vladimir Putin, on an election campaign stop in the Ural mountains, was briefed on the crash via telephone by his defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, and expressed his condolences to the relatives and colleagues of those killed, the Kremlin said.
Putin, who is running for re-election this month, declared in December that the Russian mission in Syria was largely completed, but casualties continue to mount.
Russia’s intervention in Syria turned the tide of the conflict in favour of the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Putin. It has been portrayed in Russia as a display of Russia’s resurgent military might, but it has come at a cost.
According to a Reuters tally based on official announcements before Tuesday’s crash, 44 Russian service personnel have died in Syria since the operation started in September 2015.
Under a decree signed by Putin, the Russian authorities do not have to disclose all deaths of service personnel in Syria because they are classified as a state secret.
The official toll does not include private military contractors who, according to people familiar with the deployment, are in Syria fighting in support of the Russian operation. Moscow denies they exist.
About 300 men working for a Kremlin-linked Russian private military firm were either killed or wounded in Syria last month when their column was attacked by US-led coalition forces, according to three sources familiar with the matter.
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