He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss intelligence matters publicly. “There’s still an investigation taking place in Egypt. We need to see the results of that investigation”. Those officials emphasized that the USA intelligence community has drawn no official conclusions, nor have United States officials examined forensic evidence from the crash site.
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By Ken Dilanian in Washington. We are now advising against all but essential travel by air through Sharm el-Sheikh airport.
Cameron said he had “every sympathy” with the Egyptians, who rely so heavily on tourism, but added he had to “put the safety of British people first”. He suggested that ulterior political and commercial motives may be behind the British statement.
The Irish Aviation Authority has directed the country’s airlines to suspend operations to and from Sharm el-Sheikh Airport as well.
“The options are nearly too many to consider”, he said in a telephone interview from Gambia.
Britain sent a team of security and defense experts to Sharm el-Sheikh, where thousands of British tourists are stranded by the British ban on flights.
The second black box contains the cockpit voice recorder (CVR). Britain has suspended all flights to and from Sinai as a precaution.
Britain’s action has irritated both Egypt and Russian Federation, and overshadowed a visit to Britain by Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi.
“We have concluded that there is a significant possibility that the crash was caused by an explosive device on board the aircraft…”
Cameron’s Downing St. office said in a statement that it could not say “categorically” why the Russian jet had crashed.
The plane crashed on Saturday.
And British Foreign Minister Philip Hammond said his government believes there is a “significant possibility” that an explosive device caused the crash.
Cameron’s office said additional security measures will be in place, including only allowing passengers to carry hand baggage, while checked luggage will be transported separately. The dates of the crash and the pledge roughly coincide according to the Islamic calendar.
If it wasn’t terrorism, armchair investigators have pointed at a few kind of technical mishap aboard the plane that caused it to break up at cruising altitude.
But the militants on Wednesday repeated the claim they downed the jet, an apparent act of revenge for Moscow’s decision to launch a bombing campaign in Syria on September 30.
“It doesn’t 100% mean yes, but it is leaning in that direction”, the US official said, adding that it is still unclear whether ISIS itself or its affiliate, ISIS Sinai Province, planned and executed the attack. El-Sissi has called the IS claim “propaganda” created to embarrass his government.
CEO of the Irish Travel Agents Association Pat Dawson, said that as it happened, there was not a high demand for flights from Ireland to Egypt at this time of year. Germany has urged its citizens to avoid the Sinai Peninsula.
In Russian Federation, Igor Albin, deputy governor of St Petersburg, said families have so far identified the bodies of 33 of the victims, most of whom were holidaymakers from the city. Similarly, Russian media reported there were no signs of blast-related trauma found on the recovered bodies.
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Russian and Egyptian rescue workers expanded their search area in the Sinai to 40 square kilometers (15 square miles).
