Russian search team leaves Egypt after plane crash work

And USA officials are more confident that terrorists bombed the Russian plane, killing all 224 people aboard.

Last Wednesday, the United Kingdom suspended flights to Sharm el-Sheikh and two days later, Russian Federation went a step further, suspending all flights to Egypt amid airport security concerns – a move that threatened to further devastate the Egyptian tourism industry, already suffering after years of political turmoil. Another said it was “likely”. But not long after takeoff, it disintegrated midair and crashed in the Sinai Peninsula.

Only an analysis of the wreckage could determine if a bomb caused the crash, Hammond said. The timer would have been set for enough time to initiate the explosion only after the plane had taken off, according to the officials.

The decision to suspend flights with immediate effect came after a team of British security experts made an initial security assessment in Sharm el-Sheikh, but the government has yet to identify IS as the perpetrators.

“Given the ongoing investigation, we are particularly focused on what happened, understanding what happened, and what more we could do in that region”, Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson said on Saturday. Experts from Russian Federation, France, Germany and Ireland – countries that are connected in various ways to the Airbus A321-200 that crashed – are also investigating.

It is not clear how much USA intelligence and law enforcement agencies have learned about the crash, which occurred October 31.

President Vladimir Putin’s chief of staff, Sergei Ivanov, said on a visit to Finland that it would be impossible to radically revise Egypt’s security system in a short time, according to Russian news reports.

The intercepts are among pieces of evidence leading US officials to suspect that a device planted on Metrojet Flight 9268 exploded shortly after the Airbus A321 took off from the resort city of Sharm al-Sheikh, the sources said.

Within hours of the Metrojet crash, a faction of the Islamic State militant group claimed to have downed the plane in retaliation for Moscow’s airstrikes that began a month earlier against militants in Syria, a claim that was initially dismissed by both Russian Federation and Egypt. That’s prompted questions about the claim among observers, considering ISIS’ tendency to publicize its acts for propaganda value.

But the officials, who shared details of USA national security discussions regarding the downed plane, stressed that they are no closer to a true understanding of what occurred.

Several officials said it’s the specificity of the chatter that has contributed to the US and British view that a bomb was most likely used.

The crash might have been caused by a lithium battery or a mechanical issue, Muqaddam said.

He also said that bad weather has hampered the investigation.

Nearly 5,300 holidaymakers have returned home since flights recommenced on Friday, with 1,936 departing from the Red Sea resort on eight flights yesterday. The others were of Ukrainian, Belarusian or unconfirmed citizenship. Emirates does not operate regular flights to Sharm al-Sheikh.