Metrojet Flight

Uncertainty over the possible causes of the Russian airplane crash in Egypt's Sinai peninsula has risen as US and UK intelligence suggested that the airplane might have been bombed.

Their suggestions are supported by the claims of militants affiliated to Islamic State (IS), who had accepted responsibility for taking down the airplane.

Evidence now suggests that a bomb planted by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militant group is the likely cause of last weekend's crash of a Russian airliner over Egypt's Sinai peninsula, U.S. and European security sources said on Nov 4. 

Isis militants released an audio message repeating their claim to have brought down the Russian jet which crashed on Saturday and caused the death of hundreds Russian tourists and crew.

Egypt’s civil aviation ministry said there were no facts proving that the Russian plane that crashed in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula on Saturday broke up in mid-air.

The spokesman for the ministry, Mohamed Rahmi, has told Reuters that no distress call had been received before the crash.

Only an external impact could have caused a Russian plane to dive into the Egyptian desert, killing all 224 people on board, the airline said on Nov. 2, adding to a series of incomplete and confusing statements from investigators that left unclear why the plane broke up in mid-flight.

Russian airline Kogalymavia, which operated the Airbus A321 that crashed in Egypt's Sinai peninsula on Saturday, has blamed the crash on a midair mechanical impact.

According to a senior manager of the company, the crash resulted from a major damage caused to the airplane's frame in flight.

Dmitry Peskov, spokesperson of Russian President Vladimir Putin, said that no possible causes of the Saturday's crash of a Russian airplane in Egypt should be ruled out.

According to him, no possible causes should be ruled out for the moment as the investigators were only starting their work.

Some of the biggest airlines in the world - Emirates, Lufthansa and Air France - decided to suspend flights over the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt, after a Russian airplane crashed on Saturday leaving all 224 people on board dead.

Lufthansa and Air France were the first to take the measure, announcing hours after the incident  they would suspend flights over the region.

The Kogalymavia-operated Airbus A321 (Flight 9268) fyling from Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg disappeared from radar screens at 6.14 a.m. It crashed near the town of Hasna in the north of the Sinai Peninsula with no survivors among the 224 passengers and crew members, aged from 10 months old to 22 years.

Victor Sorochenko, the head of Russia’s Interstate Aviation Committee, said it was too early to conclude what caused the crash on Saturday killing all 224 people on board.

After inspecting the crash site on the Sinai peninsula, he told reporters debris was found across a 20sq km-wide area of Sinai.