US officials say they believe the Ukrainian International Airlines Boeing 737-800 was hit by a missile, CBS says.
Ukraine earlier said it was examining whether a missile strike brought down the aircraft - but Iran ruled this out.
The crash came just hours after Iran carried out missile strikes on two airbases housing US forces in Iraq.
CBS
News quoted US intelligence sources as saying a satellite detected
infrared "blips" of two missile launches, followed by another blip of an
explosion.
Meanwhile, Newsweek quoted a Pentagon and senior US
intelligence officials, as well as an Iraqi intelligence official, as
saying they believed the Ukrainian plane was hit by a Russian-made Tor
missile.
US President Donald Trump said on Thursday that "I have
my suspicions" over the plane. "Somebody could have made a mistake," he
said.
Amid tensions heightened by the US killing of top Iranian
general Qasem Soleimani on 3 January, Iran has said it will not hand
over the recovered black box flight recorders to Boeing, the plane's
manufacturer, or to the US.
Under global aviation rules Iran has the right to lead the investigation, but manufacturers are typically involved.
What does US media report?
In
separate reports, CBS News and Newsweek said US and Iraqi intelligence
officials were confident the Ukrainian plane was brought down by a
missile fired by Iran.
CBS published a brief report on Twitter, saying the officials were confident the plane was shot down.
It
said this information was based on US intelligence, which sources said
picked up signals of a radar being turned on. US satellites also
reportedly detected two missile launches shortly before the Ukrainian
plane exploded.
Meanwhile, Newsweek quoted US and Iraqi officials
as saying they believed the aircraft was hit by a Russia-built Tor M-1
surface-to-air missile system, known as Gauntlet by Nato.
Two Pentagon officials assessed that the incident was accidental, Newsweek added.
It quoted sources as saying that Iran's anti-aircraft systems were probably active following its attacks on the US airbases.
TheNEWS BERG (Formerly Kevin Djakpor Blog) is the leading go-to sites for Breaking Political, celebrity and general news garnering millions ofpage views a month and rising rapidly.
Kevin Jakpor (CEO & Chief Editor) is the passionate and professional blogger, the founder and owner of NEWSBERG. Take a moment to click right through to his blog. It has tons of great posts on news, entertainment, culture, music, money, sports and many other fascinating areas of social life.
0 Comments