Moscow has declined to comment on reports the plane could have been accidentally shot down by its air defence.

Russia has said that Grozny, the Chechen capital where the plane was meant to land, was being attacked by Ukrainian drones that day.

It crashed near the Kazakh city of Aktau Wednesday, killing 38 of the 67 people on board.

Turkmenistan Airlines – the national carrier of the reclusive Central Asian state – is the latest airline to announce cancellations on Saturday.

It said that “regular flights between Ashgabat-Moscow-Ashgabat were cancelled from Dec 30 to Jan 31, 2025,” without giving an explanation.

The decision came after UAE airline flydubai suspended flights between Dubai and the southern Russian cities of Mineralnye Vody and Sochi that were scheduled between Dec 27 and Jan 3.

Kazakhstan’s Qazaq Air has suspended its flights to Russia’s Urals city of Yekaterinburg until the end of January.

Earlier this week, Israeli airline El Al said it was suspending its flights to Moscow for a week.

The Azerbaijan Airlines Embraer 190 crashed near the western Kazakh city of Aktau, on the shores of the Caspian Sea.

It was carrying out a flight between Azerbaijan’s capital Baku and the city of Grozny in Russia.

For several days, some Western experts have been pointing to a crash caused by a Russian anti-aircraft missile.

Citing preliminary results of an investigation, Azerbaijan’s transport minister said Friday that the crash suffered physical “external interference.”

On Friday, White House spokesman John Kirby said Washington has “indications” Russia may have been responsible, without giving details.