Ukrainian officials say Russia has not provided any credible evidence to support its claims that Ukrainian forces shot down a Russian military transport plane carrying Ukrainian prisoners of war who were to be exchanged for prisoners of war, the Associated Press and The Guardian reported.

Ukrainian officials say the Russians “belatedly” provided a list of 65 Ukrainian servicemen who Moscow says were killed in a plane crash in Russia’s Belgorod region on Wednesday. But, according to the team of the Ukrainian Coordination Command for Prisoners of War, the relatives of the Ukrainian prisoners of war could not recognize them in the photographs of the crash site provided by the Russian authorities.

Russia’s Defense Ministry blamed cross-border missiles for downing the Russian transport plane, but Ukraine’s military intelligence chief Kyrylo Budanov said Kyiv had not received any verified information about who was on board.

“At the moment, we have no evidence that there could be so many people on board the plane,” Budanov said.

“The claim of Russian propaganda that the Il-76 plane was transporting (on its way to) the prisoner exchange of 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war continues to raise many questions,” added the head of Ukrainian military intelligence.

On Friday, the head of the Ukrainian Air Force, General Mykola Olestiuk, also called Moscow’s statement “exaggerated Russian propaganda.”

Local authorities in Belgorod, which borders Ukraine, said all 74 people on board, including six crew members and three Russian servicemen, died in the crash. Residents of the Belgorod region posted a video on social media of a plane falling into a snowy area, and then a huge ball of fire at the crash site.

Kyiv has not confirmed or denied whether its forces shot down a Russian warplane that day, but Ukrainian officials confirmed that the prisoner exchange was to take place on Wednesday.

Russia released footage of alleged “Ukrainian prisoners” boarding the downed plane

Russia’s Investigative Committee released a video on Friday evening that it says shows Ukrainian prisoners of war boarding a Russian military transport plane that crashed on Wednesday.

The Russian committee shared a video with an explanatory text: “Images of Ukrainian prisoners of war boarding the Il-76 plane, which crashed in the Belgorod region as a result of a terrorist attack.”

Both the Investigative Committee of Russia and President Vladimir Putin accused Ukraine of hitting the plane with an anti-aircraft missile.

Kyiv has not confirmed whether it was involved or whether prisoners of war were on board, but Ukrainian authorities have cast doubt on the death toll, saying only five bodies had been taken to the Belgorod morgue.

Footage released by Moscow on Friday evening shows cars approaching the plane on the runway of the snow-covered airfield. The location is not specified, the video has no sound.

People are then seen exiting the vehicles to prepare for boarding. Only this single line of the explanatory text says that it will be Ukrainian servicemen boarding military transport, Sky News notes.

Russia says it found IDs, body parts with ‘distinctive’ tattoos at crash site

Russia also said on Friday that it had found Ukrainian identity documents, as well as human remains that could be seen with tattoos, at the crash site.

Russia’s Investigative Committee, Russia’s judicial body tasked with investigating the most serious crimes, said the human remains were collected and taken for genetic testing, and some had distinctive tattoos like those worn by captured Ukrainian soldiers Russia is taking for questioning.

The Russian Investigative Committee also reported that among the collected evidence were also “documents of Ukrainian servicemen who died as a result of the disaster, confirming their identities, as well as accompanying documents of the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service.”

Russia is the only one with access to the crash site. Reuters notes that it has not been able to independently verify the information provided by Russian authorities about what happened and what evidence was allegedly found. On Thursday, Russia’s Investigative Committee said its preliminary investigations show the plane was killed by a surface-to-air missile fired from Ukraine.

Ukraine rejected Russia’s claim that it had been warned that a plane carrying Ukrainian prisoners of war was flying over the Belgorod region at that time.

Kyiv also pointed to discrepancies in a list of names of 65 Ukrainians on board allegedly published by Russian media, saying some of them belonged to soldiers who had already returned to the country during a previous exchange.

Kremlin spokesman Dmytro Peskov said on Friday that he was not aware of the publication of the official list. He also told Russian journalists that he had no information about what would happen to the human remains and whether they would be handed over to Ukraine.

When asked whether Russia would provide the UN Security Council and other international organizations with evidence that Ukraine was involved in the downing of the plane or that it knew who was on board the plane, Peskov replied: “I have nothing to add at this stage.” . Investigators are working and after receiving all the necessary information, decisions will be made.”

Russian state media reported that the plane’s black boxes had been sent to a special Defense Ministry laboratory in Moscow and that investigators were already examining them.

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