(Update 1: adds Nato angle, alters headline, lede accordingly)
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"I won't go into details about our intelligence, but we have no reason not to believe the reports we have seen from different Allied capitals," Stoltenberg told press as he arrived for a meeting of European foreign ministers in
"They have expressed concern about information indicating that the plan may have been downed by Iranian air defense systems. That's exactly why we need a thorough investigation."
He urged full cooperation from the Iranian side.
His comments came after the US,
At a press conference in
"One thing is for certain, this airplane was not hit by a missile," Abedzadeh said. "Any remarks made before the data is extracted is not an expert opinion."
The previous evening, Canadian Prime Minister
Trudeau said Canadian officials believe that the supposed shootdown of the
At least 63 Canadians, mostly of Iranian origin, were traveling on the plane bound for
Preliminary information and videos posted online suggest the plane was on fire and had turned back round toward the airport before it crashed.
But Ukrainian prime minister
Zelensky also urged his country's "international partners", including the governments of
Abedzadeh said that countries should submit any evidence and data they might have to the world and to the
During the press conference, he said: "there was a fire on the plane for more than a minute while it was in the air" and that the location of the crash "shows the pilot was trying to return (to
Abedzadeh added that while
A team of Ukrainian experts is already working at the site to investigate the cause of the crash.
Prior to the accusations that the missile had been shot down,
In a statement, the
The accident occurred shortly after the Middle Eastern country launched more than a dozen ballistic missiles at two US military bases in
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EFE correspondents in
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