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Roundup: Retrieved bodies in Russian airliner crash flown back home: ambassador

Xinhua, November 2, 2015 Adjust font size:

Some 144 victims' bodies in a Russian airliner crash in Egypt were transferred to the Russian city of Saint Petersburg early on Monday, the Russian ambassador in Cairo said.

All the remaining bodies will be transported to Russia via Petersburg airport, as their families are waiting there. Most of the passengers of the ill-fated plane were from Petersburg and the neighboring regions, the Russian ambassador, Sergei Kerbachenko, told Xinhua.

A second plane carrying a second batch of bodies is set to leave Egypt Monday evening.

The Russian airliner crashed in Egypt's Sinai peninsula on Saturday while heading from Sharm el-Sheikh airport to Saint Petersburg. All 224 people on board, mostly Russian tourists, were killed.

Family members have been providing DNA samples at a crisis center near Saint Petersburg airport.

An official with Russia's Interstate Aviation Committee said on Sunday that the disintegration of the plane happened in the air and fragments were strewn over a large area.

"It's too early to make any judgment because still specialists are working on the analysis and the results," the ambassador said.

"I don't want anybody to speculate on the reasons," Kerbachenko added.

Data of two black boxes were recovered late Saturday. Egyptian and international investigators on Sunday begun probing the reasons behind the crash.

A militant group affiliated to the Islamic State (IS) in Egypt has claimed responsibility for the crash.

"There are always lots of rumors when such big tragedy happens, but we shouldn't speculate the reasons," Kerbachenko added, noting the analysis of the black boxes could take weeks.

The Russian diplomat said no side takes the lead in probing the reasons. "It is a joint effort between Russian and Egyptian specialists, along with international authorities represented by French and German bodies, because the plane is of a European origin."

"So they are all included in the researching groups for full transparency and clear and definite results," he added.

State-run Ahram website quoted a specialist in the committee analyzing the black box as saying the crashed Russian airliner was not struck from outside, and the pilot did not make a distress call before it disappeared from radar.

According to experts, militants could not down a plane at 30,000 feet (9,000 meters) altitude, at which the Russian Airbus 321 was flying.

Tallaat Muslam, a security and strategic expert, told Xinhua that militants affiliated to the IS in Sinai does not own surface-to-air missiles and their capabilities are so primitive and poor.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi on Saturday stressed the necessity of not jumping to incorrect conclusions over the crash before any results of the investigation are announced.

"This is a complicated matter and requires advanced technologies and broad investigations that could take months," Sisi added. Endit