It was a tense dialog between two authoritarian leaders accustomed to getting their approach.
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia was providing explanations for the Azerbaijan Airways aircraft crash that had killed 38 individuals days earlier. Maybe it was a flock of birds, Mr. Putin mentioned, or an exploding gasoline canister. Perhaps a Ukrainian drone.
However President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan was not shopping for it, based on two individuals conversant in that late December telephone name. It had turn into clear inside hours of the crash that the aircraft had been shot down by Russian air defenses in what gave the impression to be a deadly mistake. It left shrapnel lodged within the leg of 1 passenger and riddled the fuselage with holes.
On Dec. 29, Mr. Aliyev went public along with his anger with out mentioning the Russian president by title. “Makes an attempt to disclaim apparent info,” he mentioned, “are each nonsensical and absurd.”
The individuals who described the telephone name insisted on anonymity to debate delicate diplomatic communications. The Kremlin didn’t reply to a request for remark.
The furor over the aircraft crash — and Mr. Aliyev’s willingness to problem Mr. Putin in public — has revealed a outstanding breach between two post-Soviet rulers who had turn into shut over greater than 20 years in energy. Mr. Putin tried to enlist Mr. Aliyev in an obvious effort to maintain quiet the reason for the crash; Mr. Aliyev, emboldened by Russia’s weakened affect in lands it as soon as dominated, insisted that Russia publicly acknowledge its guilt.
Interviews final week with Azerbaijani officers and folks near the federal government confirmed how the Dec. 25 crash of an Embraer 190, with 67 individuals aboard, has turn into a geopolitical milestone for the previous Soviet Union. Slightly than permitting Mr. Putin to dictate his response to the tragedy, Mr. Aliyev has repeatedly lashed out at Russia over its failure to simply accept accountability.
Rasim Musabekov, a member of the Azerbaijani Parliament’s overseas affairs committee, described Russia’s response to the crash as “an absurd perspective.”
“Azerbaijan is not going to settle for such a chauvinist perspective,” he added.
Behind the scenes, the interviews confirmed, these tensions flared straight between Mr. Aliyev and Mr. Putin, although the 2 autocrats have usually discovered widespread floor. Within the name on Dec. 28 and one other the following day, the individuals conversant in the calls mentioned, Mr. Putin urged Mr. Aliyev to comply with have a Moscow-based aviation physique examine the crash. Mr. Aliyev refused, insisting that the aircraft’s black containers be decoded in Brazil, the place the jet was made, a putting show of distrust of the Russian chief.
Officers in Azerbaijan’s capital, Baku, organized interviews for The New York Instances with three survivors, who mentioned it grew to become clear to some passengers that they have been beneath assault instantly after a minimum of two explosions rocked the aircraft in midair.
After the second blast, a lady began screaming. Leyla Omarova, 28, regarded throughout the aisle from her window seat and noticed the woman’s tights stained with blood.
Three rows behind them, Nurullah Sirajov, 71, had been making an attempt to consolation his spouse. The primary bang should have been the touchdown gear, he’d advised her. That they had by no means flown earlier than.
Then got here the second explosion, a rush of wind from the again of the aircraft and yells, he mentioned, from different passengers: “They hit us.”
Because the jet jerked up and down, coming inside 100 ft of the Caspian Sea, Mr. Sirajov thought that a minimum of his and his spouse’s marital squabbles over who would die first would lastly be resolved: They’d die collectively. However after the entrance a part of the aircraft disintegrated on impression, the tail part broke off, turned over and slid tons of of yards by means of the sandy soil.
“Anybody alive?” Mr. Sirajov remembers yelling within the sudden silence as he dangled upside-down from his seatbelt.
As a result of Europe closed its airspace to Russia after Mr. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, many Russians flying westward now join in Azerbaijan, an oil-and-gas-rich former Soviet republic of 10 million sandwiched between Russia and Iran. Russia additionally sees Azerbaijan as a key hyperlink in an expanded trade route south to Iran, India and the Persian Gulf.
Its position as a transit level for a Russia beset by sanctions is only one approach that Azerbaijan has seen its leverage rise towards its far bigger northern neighbor. Mr. Aliyev has additionally taken benefit of the Russian navy’s distraction in Ukraine to push Russian peacekeeping troops out of Nagorno-Karabakh, the Armenian-controlled enclave that Azerbaijan recaptured in 2023.
Mr. Aliyev has solidified his nation’s alliance with Turkey and armed Azerbaijan with high-tech weapons bought from Israel. He has waged a fierce crackdown against activists and independent journalists, however has maintained a relationship with Europe, which sees Azerbaijan as a key different to Russian oil and gasoline.
Farhad Mammadov, a political analyst in Baku, mentioned that Russia’s political and financial “levers of strain” on Azerbaijan had been lowered to “virtually none.” Aykhan Hajizada, the spokesman for Azerbaijan’s Overseas Ministry, was blunt in arguing that his nation had leverage over Russia: “They don’t need to lose Azerbaijan as effectively,” he mentioned.
The uproar over the aircraft crash has emerged as a check case. A senior American diplomat, talking on situation of anonymity as a result of he was not licensed to remark publicly, described the fallout from the crash as “a proof of idea” for Azerbaijan’s capability to stay up for itself. Different post-Soviet international locations which have additionally sought a extra arm’s-length relationship with Russia, like Kazakhstan, are watching carefully.
“If that is the way you behave on this incident with Azerbaijan, then what’s going to the Uzbeks, the Kazakhs and the opposite remaining companions of Russia consider you?” Mr. Musabekov, the member of Parliament, requested. “It’s that Russia, as a state, is a really, very poisonous companion that it’s worthwhile to reduce relations with.”
Mr. Aliyev, who studied in Moscow and took over as Azerbaijan’s ruler from his father in 2003, discovered concerning the crash whereas en path to a summit of post-Soviet leaders in St. Petersburg. He referred to as Mr. Putin from the aircraft to inform him he was not coming.
Hours later, Azerbaijani officers landed in Aktau, Kazakhstan, the airport the place the Embraer 190 had tried to make an emergency touchdown. On the crash website close by, the officers instantly realized that the theories of a chicken strike or exploded oxygen canister that that they had been listening to from Russia have been improper.
“After I noticed the plane, it was riddled with holes,” Rinat Huseynov, the protection director for Azerbaijan Airways, mentioned in an interview. “We didn’t think about that this was potential in any respect.”
Mr. Aliyev and Mr. Putin spoke once more twice within the days after the crash. Mr. Putin apologized for the “tragic incident” taking place in Russian airspace however didn’t acknowledge that Russia had shot down the aircraft. The day after the apology, on Dec. 29, Mr. Aliyev went public to accuse Russia of a cover-up.
“Sadly, for the primary three days, we heard nothing from Russia aside from some absurd theories,” Mr. Aliyev said.
Officers mentioned they anticipated preliminary findings from the investigation by the tip of January. Mr. Aliyev reiterated final week that Russia wanted to simply accept accountability and pay compensation, whereas the Kremlin mentioned it was cooperating with the probe.
“We’re fascinated about a completely goal and unbiased investigation,” Dmitri S. Peskov, Mr. Putin’s spokesman, advised reporters final week.
The Azerbaijanis’ working idea is that the shrapnel from exploding missiles of a Russian Pantsir air-defense system broken the aircraft. Steel fragments as massive as 4 inches lengthy have been discovered on the crash website.
The flight knowledge and cockpit voice recorders, officers mentioned, might assist clarify why the pilots selected to cross the Caspian Sea to land in Kazakhstan slightly than at a better airport in Russia; Mr. Huseynov, the airline security director, mentioned the choice appeared logical given the cloudy circumstances in southern Russia on the time.
Contained in the passenger cabin, the flight attendants have been making an attempt to calm the panic. Ms. Omarova, en path to see household in Russia, mentioned she misplaced consciousness. Mr. Sirajov, who had packed New Yr’s presents for grandchildren in Grozny, mentioned all he might take into consideration was comforting his spouse.
Flight data exhibits that after crossing the Caspian Sea, greater than an hour after the pilots reported what they thought was a chicken strike, the aircraft crashed on a second try to land at Aktau airport. All the survivors have been sitting in roughly the rear third of the aircraft, based on an individual near the investigation.
After the tail part got here to a cease, Mr. Sirajov fumbled within the darkness to open his seatbelt, unable to inform what had occurred to his spouse. Solely later did he be taught that she had additionally survived.
Lastly, Mr. Sirajov yanked his belt open and tumbled onto the cabin’s ceiling. “Go that approach, go that approach,” he recollects listening to as somebody pushed him towards a sliver of sunshine.
