The 53-page preliminary report published by Kazakhstan's transport ministry included photographs of the plane.

An Azerbaijani passenger plane that crashed in December after being diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan had suffered external damage and was riddled with holes in its fuselage, according to a report published on a Kazakh government website on Tuesday.

BAKU (Reuters) - An Azerbaijani passenger plane that crashed in December after being diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan was hit by a Russian Pantsir-S air defence system, an Azerbaijani government source told Reuters on Tuesday.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin meets Azerbaijan's Ambassador Rakhman Mustafayev in Moscow - Anadolu Ajansı

The 53-page preliminary report published by Kazakhstan's transport ministry included photographs of the plane.

Russian civil aviation authorities said Wednesday that they have not been granted access to the “foreign objects” that damaged an Azerbaijani jet before it crashed in Kazakhstan last month. Kazakhstan’s Transportation Ministry on Tuesday published preliminary findings of its investigation into the crash of Azerbaijan Airlines Flight 8243.

An Azerbaijani passenger aircraft that crashed last December was hit by a Russian Pantsir-S air defense system, according to Tuesday report by Reuters. The plane had been diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan before the incident occurred.