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The Guardian
A top American intelligence official has said “no direct evidence” had yet emerged pointing to terrorism being involved in Saturday’s crash of a Russian Metrojet airliner in Egypt’s Sinai desert that killed all 224 people on board.But adding to the continuing cloud of mystery around the incident – whose causes are not known – James Clapper, the US director of national intelligence, said a terrorist attack could still not be ruled out.
Clapper’s comments came amid a day of contradictory statements as claims by the airline’s operator that a technical fault could not be blamed were slapped down as premature by a senior Russian aviation official.
DW
James Clapper, the US Director of National Intelligence, said on Monday that although there was no evidence a terrorist attack was behind the Russian plane crash it remained a possible cause.
"We don't have any direct evidence of any terrorist involvement yet," Clapper said in Washington. "It's unlikely, but I wouldn't rule it out."
He added that although the "Islamic State" has a presence in Sinai he didn't believe the terrorist organization has the capability to shoot down the aircraft at 30,000 feet.
The "Islamic State" affiliate in the Sinai claimed responsibility on Saturday for the crash but the claims have not been validated. Russian and Egyptian officials have dismissed the claim.
Al Jazeera America
As investigators began to analyze the flight recorders of the Russian jet that crashed in the Egyptian desert, the airline, Russian officials, and aviation and security experts put forward different possible explanations for the crash that killed all 224 people on board.A source in the committee analyzing the flight recorders told Reuters that the jet was not struck from the outside and the pilot made no distress calls before it disappeared from radar.
James Clapper, the U.S. director of national intelligence, meanwhile, said he could not rule out that the plane, which was carrying Russians from the Sharm El-Sheikh resort to St. Petersburg in Russia, was brought down by a local affiliate of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL.)
Reuters
The Russian plane that crashed in Egypt was not struck from the outside and the pilot did not make a distress call before it disappeared from radar, a source in the committee analyzing the flight recorders said on Monday.The source declined to give more details but based his comments on the preliminary examination of the black boxes recovered from the Airbus A321 which crashed in the Sinai Peninsula on Saturday killing all 224 people on board.
The Egyptian government said the black boxes were being examined by Egyptian and Russian experts along with German and French specialists from Airbus and from Ireland where the aircraft was registered. It said the search was continuing across the 9-sq-km crash site. Security sources said intelligence agencies had obtained a copy of the passenger list.
BBC
The Russian airline Kogalymavia has blamed "external influence" for Saturday's Sinai plane crash which killed 224 people.A senior airline official said: "The only reasonable explanation is that it was [due to] external influence."
An investigation by aviation experts using data from the aircraft's "black boxes" has yet to give its conclusions.
The head of Russia's Federal Aviation Agency said it was premature to speculate on the cause of the crash.
"This kind of talk is... not based on any proper facts," Aleksandr Neradko said on Russian TV.