- Laura Gozzi & Paul Kirby
- BBC news
The BBC has reviewed this video showing the moment the Russian plane crashed in the Belgorod region.
A Russian military transport plane, Ilyushin 76, crashed south of Belgorod near Ukraine.
Russia's Ministry of Defense announced that 65 captured Ukrainian military personnel were on board a plane headed to the region for a prisoner exchange.
Ukrainian military intelligence later issued a statement accusing Russia of endangering the lives of prisoners.
He said he had not been informed of the need to secure safe airspace over Belgorod.
Ukraine's statement is seen as a tacit admission that Ukraine shot down the plane.
Nine more people were on board the plane, including six crew members, the Rianovosti news agency said.
A video shared on social media shows the plane crashing near the village of Yablonovo, 70 kilometers (44 miles) northeast of Belgorod city, at around 11 a.m. local time (8 a.m. local time), causing an explosion and a fireball. was reflected. GMT).
Vyacheslav Gladkov, the governor of Russia's Belgorod region, said the plane crashed into a field near a residential area, killing everyone on board.
Ukraine's General Staff, quoted by the Ukraiska Pravda website, initially said the plane was carrying missiles for Russia's S-300 air defense system. He did not mention prisoners.
None of the details regarding the crew can be independently verified, but Ukrainian military intelligence appears to acknowledge that Ukrainian prisoners of war may have been on board.
Russia said in a statement that it was Russia's responsibility to “ensure the security of our garrisons in accordance with the agreements reached,” but that in this case it was not clear that it had to protect its airspace “at set times.” said that it had not been done. As on many previous occasions.
“This may indicate a deliberate Russian action aimed at threatening the lives and safety of prisoners of war,” it added.
Ahead of the planned prisoner exchange, Ukrainian authorities said the captured Russian servicemen had been “delivered to the agreed location in time for the exchange, where they were safe.”
Russia's Ministry of Defense announced that the exchange was scheduled to take place on Wednesday afternoon at a border crossing 100 kilometers west of Belgorod.
The Defense Ministry said the military transport plane took off from Chkalovsky Air Base northeast of Moscow on its way to Belgorod, and claimed that the Ukrainian Air Force fired two anti-aircraft missiles from the Lipsy area south of Ukraine's border.
The Ukrainian government agency responsible for the prisoners warned that Russia was “actively conducting special intelligence operations against Ukraine aimed at destabilizing Ukrainian society.”
Dmytro Rubinets, member of the Human Rights Committee of Ukraine's parliament, called on Ukrainians to trust only official sources, saying: “Do not be fooled by provocations. We will provide more detailed information later.”
Andrei Kartapolov, chairman of the Russian parliament's defense committee, claimed that a second plane carrying 80 Ukrainian prisoners was flying, but that the plane then changed course.
“There is no other way to talk about it. [prisoner] We exchanged it,” Kartapolov told Russian television.
Ukraine and Russia have participated in numerous prisoner exchanges since the beginning of the war.
More than 8,000 Ukrainians, both civilian and military, remain in Russian custody, and tens of thousands more remain unaccounted for, according to Ukraine's Headquarters for the Coordination of Prisoners of War Treatment.
Immediately after news of the Il-76 crash broke, a temporary national air raid warning was issued for all of Ukraine.
Belgorod is located about 40 kilometers north of the border with Ukraine and has suffered dozens of casualties from airstrikes and drones since the beginning of the Ukraine war.
Russia last week claimed to have captured a village near the devastated city of Bakhmut in Ukraine's eastern Donetsk region. Kiev has not confirmed this claim.
Ukraine's Defense Minister Rustem Umerov warned that Russia has used more than 600 missiles and 1,000 drones in the past two months while the Ukrainian military is suffering from a shortage of ammunition.
Ukraine, on the other hand, primarily uses drones to fight. Over the weekend, a drone attack caused an explosion at a major gas export terminal near the city of St. Petersburg.
