“The information we have heard about has not been shared with Egyptian security agencies in detail”, the foreign minister said at a news conference, according to the Independent.
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Earlier on Friday, the head of Russia’s Federal Security Service, a successor agency of the Soviet KGB, called for Russian Federation to suspend flights from Egypt.
STR/EPA The crash of Metrojet Airbus A321-200 that killed all 224 onboard has other carriers on high alert for similiar incidents. On its website, the flight status of the planes due to arrive in Sharm El Sheikh said they were delayed.
In response to British Prime Minister David Cameron’s use of the word “bomb” when discussing the possibility of a terrorist bomb bringing down the Russian plane, Earnest said Thursday, “At this point we don’t have enough information to make our own determination about what exactly occurred”.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered the suspension of all Russian flights to Egypt following a deadly passenger plane crash in the African country.
The airliner, carrying mostly Russian families returning from Red Sea vacations, was 23 minutes into its flight on Saturday from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg, Russia, when it disappeared from radar over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
Passengers were told heightened security measures meant their luggage would be flown back to Britain separately and returned to them seven to ten days later and that they would be permitted to take just 5 kilograms (11 pounds) of hand luggage with them.
British attempts to bring home thousands of stranded tourists were thrown into chaos on Friday when Egypt reduced the number of flights it would allow to take them home.
The ambassador was confronted by frustrated British tourists as he visited the Sharm El Sheikh worldwide Airport, who reporters described as “angry” and “exasperated”.
In his first public comments on the disaster, US President Barack Obama said in a radio interview: “There’s a possibility that there was a bomb on board”. “The Egyptian authorities have cooperated and continue to cooperate fully”.
The Kremlin’s decision is a blow to Egypt’s tourism economy, which depends in large part on European vacationers.
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The British government said it had concluded that the incident “was not a targeted attack and was likely to be connected to routine exercises being conducted by the Egyptian military” in the area.
