And if something is wrong, not our business

A special flight squad "Russia" provides passenger transportation and does not engage in cargo. This was stated by the manager of the Presidential Affairs Alexander Kolpakov, RIA Novosti reports .

So Kolpakov commented on the media reports that during the control supply of suitcases with flour with the flour, which was replaced by cocaine in them, was delivered to Moscow with the IL-96 liner detachment 96023. Photos of the loading of suitcases in this aircraft were published by the Argentine national gendarmerie.

“I saw photos, those that were in the press,” said Kolpakov. “We provide (transportation) of senior officials. And as for the goods, there are special organs for this.”

When asked whether the photographs are really depicted on the side of the Russia, the Presidential Administration repeated: "We carry out passenger transportation, and we do not engage in cargoes."

On Monday, RBC reported that the on-board number of the aircraft, which appeared in the case of the suppression of drug supplies from Argentina to Russia, coincides with the IL-96 Rossiya Il-96 number. Prior to this, the Minister of National Security of Argentina Patricia Bullrich said that the control cargo was sent "as a diplomatic baggage on the Russian government aircraft" in December 2017.

On the same day, the press secretary of the Presidential Manager Elena Krylova said that Il-96 pictures were falsified . "Journalists made conclusions on the basis of inaccurate information - in this case, photographs, which, thanks to modern technologies, can be easily falsified," the press secretary emphasized. Krylova drew attention to the fact that in the picture "there is no exact side number." The spokesman called on journalists to use "proven information from official sources."

On Monday evening, the Russian Aviation Project closed by Russian aviation, to which the site owner referred to in his publication that no one demanded to close the resource. He explained that the information on it was compiled from different sites automatically. “No one demanded this from me,” said the owner of the site. “Perhaps something worked wrong there. I am a little tense now, so I took and deleted it, I don’t want to substitute anyone”

The disclosure of the drug trafficking scheme became known on February 22 . In the diplomatic mail prepared for the sending of the Russian embassy in Buenos Aires, 12 suitcases with 389 kilograms of cocaine were found. The drug was packaged in 360 packages. Argentine law enforcement agencies with the consent of Russia replaced the drug with flour and conducted a control supply.

In December 2017, in Russia , the former head of the embassy Ali Abyanov was arrested in this case (he was called the former accountant of the embassy, ​​and not a manager), who was declared the owner of the suitcases, as well as Vladimir Kalmykov and Istmir Khujamov. In Argentina itself, the police inspector Buenos Aires Ivan Blizyuk and mechanic Alexander Chikalo were arrested.

On Sunday evening, in Berlin, the German police detained the alleged organizer of Cocaine smuggling Andrei Kovalchuk. On Wednesday, he said through his lawyer that the drug was thrown into his suitcases . "Kovalchuk is convinced that the drugs were thrown by the Argentine police with the participation of the American special services in this provocation in order to discredit the Russian diplomatic mission," the lawyer said. According to Gerebenkov, his client insists that coffee, alcohol, personal belongings and gifts were in the suitcases.

Meanwhile, Kommersant published Abyanov's testimony. In them, he claimed that in 2012 and 2014 he sent three suitcases belonging to Kovalchuk from the Montevideo Airport on Russian military transport aircraft. For each suitcase, he paid Abyanov 1 thousand dollars. According to the former manager, he learned about the contents of suitcases after his detention. “I thought that I was making smuggling of wine, coffee and semi -lens stones,” Abyanov said.