Ukraine's president last met President Donald Trump at the White House in October - EPA/ShutterstockKazakhstan's aviation investigators released a one-year interim statement on December 25, 2025, detailing evidence gathered in the investigation of Azerbaijan Airlines Flight J2-8243, the Embraer 190 that crashed near Aktau on December 25, 2024.
The aircraft, registration 4K-AZ65, had been operating a passenger flight from Baku, Azerbaijan, to Grozny, Russia. According to the Kazakh investigation commission's interim statement, 38 people, including three crew members, were killed and 29 people sustained injuries of varying severity.
The anniversary statement did not constitute a final accident report. Investigators said they were continuing work to establish the accident's causes and contributing factors, with several technical analyses still incomplete.
Investigators Examine External Metal Damage
One of the most significant findings concerns foreign metallic objects recovered during the investigation. Kazakhstan's commission said forensic examinations found no traces of explosive substances on the objects and no evidence of an explosion on three oxygen cylinders that were examined.
However, investigators said the aircraft's damage was preliminarily assessed as having been caused by damaging elements of a warhead. The commission said it had not been able to establish the origin of those elements.
That distinction is important: the interim investigation documented evidence consistent with external warhead fragments, but the Kazakh commission had not yet issued a final determination of the accident's cause or formally identified the origin of the fragments in its December 2025 statement.
Investigators separately examined part of hydraulic system No. 2. They found rupture damage caused by contact with hard objects and said through-type damage may have resulted from external metallic fragments made from iron-based alloys such as steel.
Flight Recorders and Technical Evidence
The commission reported substantial progress in analyzing the aircraft's recorders. Flight parameters from the flight data recorder were retrieved, identified and decoded, while data from the cockpit voice recorder were also decoded.
The work builds on Kazakhstan's preliminary investigation report issued on February 4, 2025, which documented extensive damage to the aircraft and the presence of foreign objects in parts of the wreckage.
Investigators also examined the Central Maintenance Computer cassette removed from the aircraft's Modular Avionics Unit at Honeywell International's facilities. Severe thermal exposure prevented recovery of its data. Honeywell recommended further work with Delkin Devices, the manufacturer of the memory card, and the commission said it was coordinating with the accredited U.S. representative over additional examination.
GPS cassettes removed from two avionics modular units manufactured by CMC Electronics were also examined. The technical work had been completed by the time of the interim statement, while analysis of the results remained in progress.
Conflict-Zone Flight Risk Under Review
The investigation commission created two specialized working groups. One is examining how risks associated with flying over or near conflict zones were assessed, using guidance contained in International Civil Aviation Organization documentation.
The group is reviewing material supplied by Russian and Azerbaijani aviation authorities and Azerbaijan Airlines, including procedures for assessing flight risks. Investigators are also examining coordination between civilian and military sectors in relation to aviation safety.
This part of the investigation is particularly significant because the aircraft encountered problems while approaching Grozny during a period of Ukrainian drone activity in southern Russia.
The second working group reconstructed elements of the Embraer 190's hydraulic system in Aktau to help investigators analyze the sequence of system damage and technical failures.
Russia and Azerbaijan Gave Different Accounts Before Later Acknowledgment
The crash quickly became a major diplomatic issue between Azerbaijan and Russia. In the days after the disaster, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said the aircraft had been damaged by external fire over Russian territory and called on Moscow to acknowledge responsibility.
Russian President Vladimir Putin initially apologized to Aliyev for what the Kremlin described as a “tragic incident†that occurred in Russian airspace while Russian air defenses were responding to Ukrainian drone attacks, without at that stage explicitly accepting responsibility for striking the aircraft.
Later, in October 2025, Putin publicly acknowledged that Russian air-defense missiles had been involved in the incident and told Aliyev that Russia would provide compensation. That political acknowledgment is separate from Kazakhstan's technical aviation investigation, whose final conclusions remained pending.
The case illustrates the broader risks posed to civilian aviation when commercial flights operate near active military activity. It also recalls concerns raised after other incidents involving civilian aviation and the war in Ukraine, although each accident has its own circumstances and investigative record.
International Investigation Continues
Accredited representatives from Azerbaijan, Russia and Brazil have participated in Kazakhstan's investigation, alongside an observer from the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). Brazil's participation reflects its role as the state of aircraft manufacture for the Embraer 190.
The investigation follows the international framework for aircraft accident investigations under ICAO Annex 13. Kazakhstan's Transport Ministry has emphasized that the safety investigation is intended to establish causes and contributing factors and prevent similar accidents, rather than determine criminal or civil liability.
Kazakh authorities have separately said that law-enforcement agencies are conducting a criminal investigation. The safety investigation and proceedings intended to determine legal responsibility are therefore distinct processes.
Final Cause Still Awaits the Official Report
The December 2025 interim statement did not establish a final probable cause. Kazakhstan said completion of the investigation depended on outstanding examinations and other investigative work.
The final report is expected to set out the commission's conclusions on the cause or causes of the accident, contributing factors and aviation-safety recommendations.
As of the interim stage, the evidence established that the aircraft sustained extensive external damage and that investigators considered warhead-related fragments a likely mechanism for some of that damage. The exact technical sequence, contributing factors and the commission's final attribution remained matters for the completed investigation.
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