Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said on Sunday that the passenger plane that crashed in Kazakhstan killing 38 people had been damaged due to shooting from the ground in Russia, Azerbaijan state television reported.

Vladimir Putin has apologised for the Azerbaijan Airlines crash but stopped short of accepting responsibility for what he described as a “tragic incident”.

Vladimir Putin admitted Saturday Russian air defence was working when an Azerbaijani Airlines plane tried to land in Grozny before crashing, breaking the Kremlin's silence as speculation mounted Russia may have accidentally shot the plane.