An Azerbaijani passenger plane that crashed in December after being diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan had suffered external damage and was riddled with holes in its fuselage, according to a report published on a Kazakh government website on Tuesday.

BAKU (Reuters) - An Azerbaijani passenger plane that crashed in December after being diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan was hit by a Russian Pantsir-S air defence system, an Azerbaijani government source told Reuters on Tuesday.

The Ministry of Digital Development and Transport of the Republic of Azerbaijan has published a preliminary report on the investigation of the crash of the Embraer 190 passenger plane belonging to AZAL near Aktau Airport.

ASTANA - An Azerbaijani passenger plane that crashed in December after being diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan had suffered damage \"probably caused by external objects,\" according to a preliminary report published on a Kazakh government website on Tuesday.

The 53-page preliminary report published by Kazakhstan's transport ministry included photographs of the plane.

Azerbaijan plans to sue Russia for the downing of its Embraer E190 plane over Grozny if Moscow does not acknowledge fault, according to a report by "Azeri-Press" (APA). The agency states that evidence,

Russian civil aviation authorities said Wednesday that they have not been granted access to the “foreign objects” that damaged an Azerbaijani jet before it crashed in Kazakhstan last month. Kazakhstan’s Transportation Ministry on Tuesday published preliminary findings of its investigation into the crash of Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 8243.