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Britain hopes flights to UK could leave Sharm al-Sheikh on Friday

According to the Czech Association of Travel Agencies there are presently around 2,000 Czechs on holiday in Egypt, but none of them in Sharm el-Sheikh.

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Egypt has said the cockpit voice recorder is partially damaged and a lot of work is required to extract data from it. On Thursday, the airline said it suspended all flights of Airbus A321 jets in its fleet.

Shortly after the crash, an Egyptian ISIL group claimed responsibility, but Russian and Egyptian officials immediately dismissed the claim.

Speaking to The News, the defence source did not say whether or not the team would be helping with any plans to evacuate a few 20,000 British nationals stranded in the country.

United Kingdom transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin said he hoped flights could resume on Friday after reviewing security standards at the Sharm el-Sheikh airport. The director of the airport was sacked Wednesday.

Germany’s Lufthansa group, which also owns Eurowings and Edelweiss airlines, announced it is temporarily suspending flights to the Sinai in a statement on Thursday, following concerns a bomb may have downed the Russian plane.

Meanwhile, Cameron welcomed the Egyptian president to Downing Street on a pre-planned trip – his first visit to Britain since the overthrow of his predecessor Mohamed Morsi in 2013.

Citing intelligence, Cameron told reporters it was “more likely than not that it was a terrorist bomb” that had caused the crash, a view shared by Washington.

Britain wants “to start as soon as possible” to bring tourists home, he said.

Islamic State, which also has a presence in Egypt’s neighbor Libya, is waging a campaign of suicide bombings and shootings in Egypt created to topple the government of President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

Holidaymakers reacted angrily to being charged more money to stay in the resort’s hotels.

He told ITV’s Good Morning Britain: “These are special additional measures, not necessarily something that we could do on a sustainable basis but something that we will put in as a short term special measure to get back home the people who are there now”. He added a few short-term measures would include different luggage-handling arrangements.

David Cameron has now said the Metrojet flight was “more likely than not” brought down by a terrorist bomb.

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Earlier, USA intelligence suggested the crash was probably caused by a bomb planted on board by the Islamic State extremists.

Scene of the Russian plane crash in Sinai Egypt