The final cause of the plane crash in Egypt has been revealed

The cause of the crash of a Russian plane over the Sinai was a terrorist attack. The head of the FSB, Alexander Bortnikov, reported this to the president. According to him, an improvised explosive device with a capacity of up to 1.5 kg of TNT went off on board the A321 of the Kogalymavia company. Traces of foreign-made explosives were found as a result of an examination of personal belongings, luggage and aircraft parts. First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs Leonid Kalashnikov answered questions from Kommersant FM host Alexei Korneev.

Vladimir Putin promised to find the organizers of the terrorist attack.

— It turns out that the president had this meeting late on Monday, apparently at night. Why was this data, these footage from the meeting, made public only on Tuesday afternoon literally a few minutes ago? Why wasn’t this announced immediately at night?

- This was connected not only with how to promote this message, how to post it, how to announce it, what time people would go to work, but also with the fact that, perhaps, once again check some data that the president decided to clarify and entrusted this to the special services. But this is to understand for sure and know that this is not some kind of mistake, delusion or powder in a test tube.

— Did you already have this data on Monday, or maybe some messages, information in the State Duma, or with you personally?

- No, we had different versions that circulated, no more than people watching certain programs, but I, as an expert in this matter, assessed them and refracted them through my prism, and I even spoke about this in the media more than once, more leaned towards the version of a terrorist attack. And I had every reason for this, because no matter what they said about all sorts of technical reasons and malfunctions, it still made it possible to write down, answer, say certain words to the crew, the flight director. But this was not done.

— The President stated that Russia will act in accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter, which provides for the right of states to self-defense. What right is this and what rights will Russia have in connection with this article?

“We are talking about some kind of emergency measures that will be prescribed in a special presidential decree. These measures, first of all, strengthen security services. Agent work, which was destroyed in the 1990s, is a very painstaking, serious work that was created over the centuries both in the Tsarist Empire and in the Soviet regime. Therefore, there is no other option here, if we talk about strengthening security services, except for the fact that technology has stepped forward in wiretapping and cameras.

But from the point of view of political measures, including “fly-bomb” or a foreign state or unit taking responsibility, it is somewhat more complicated. The Americans followed the path of their national pact. But at the same time, we say that we must respect the international legal order. For now, we follow this constantly and responsibly. I don’t see this among our so-called “partners”. Even with all my respect for the French and with all my condolences for them, the fact that today they are intensively bombing ISIS for the second day, they are doing this, in fact, violating the international order, without securing either a decision of the Security Council or an invitation from the state that elected and which is legitimate within its borders there, I mean Syria.

In this sense, I think Russia will both strengthen its security and interpret, if possible, Putin’s words, security agencies, security services, security procedures, perhaps in some ways copying the experience of both the Soviet Union and Israel . And the second thing is to still comply with international security standards and international law and try to create a broad coalition at least from those countries that are directly related to this today, not only great countries, but also countries where there is an increased terrorist threat, the countries of the Middle East.

- But this, apparently, is also a measure of influence on those countries that Putin is talking about, or which can assist criminals and hide on their territory, that is, here, apparently, the Russian special services will have some expanded actions and measures, and the rights including, right?

- This may be so, but when I listened to Hollande at the national meeting on Monday, and he said that we would change the constitution - for example, according to the current constitution of France, one cannot be deprived of citizenship, but he proposes to deprive citizenship of, for example, such the terrorists they found there - I immediately remembered that some terrorists who are considered terrorists in Russia are currently granted such citizenship in France, the UK, and the USA. Until recently, they pranced through the forests of the North Caucasus. What to do with them, what to do with Russia’s attitude to this fact, and so on? That is, there are a lot of things here that cannot be answered immediately by listening to the president.

- Well, yes, but Putin said that the operation will not only not be curtailed, but it will intensify, won’t it give rise to counteraction, won’t this lead to new terrorist attacks?

- Any activity of Russia on this front, as well as, by the way, even the absence of such activity, does not mean a more or less increased danger.

We must always be prepared for this. Let's say, in Volgograd, the terrorist attack, the president said about it, happened without any visible Russian activity. And this is also true, well, nothing can be done. And we must be prepared for the constant terrorist danger that will accompany us for many, many years.

This is due not only to the fact that we intervened in Syria, of course, but also to the fact that almost 20 million Muslims are on our land, not all of them are, so to speak, devout Muslims, some of them are subject to processing, and We shouldn’t ignore this either. We need to work with them, understand what this can lead to, even in the Russian environment all sorts of Varvara Sentinels arise, and you can imagine what is happening among Muslims.

“Russia will strengthen its security”