A commercial airliner crashed near an airport in Kazakhstan under mysterious circumstances on Wednesday, leaving dozens of passengers dead and dozens more injured.

Authorities are now pointing to evidence that strongly suggests the Azerbaijan Airlines flight was, in effect, shot down by Russian antiaircraft weapons, according to Fox News.

If true, that would make Russia responsible for the deaths of 38 passengers and crew members and the injuring of 29 other survivors.

Passenger jet goes down in Kazakhstan

It was on Wednesday that an Azerbaijan Airlines Embraer 190 passenger jet was headed from Baku in Azerbaijan to Grozny in Russia when it suddenly altered its course and flew erratically across the Caspian Sea before it crashed a few miles short of an airport near Aktau, Kazakhstan.

Notably, the area of southwest Russia where the flight initially traversed before changing directions has been repeatedly targeted by Ukrainian drone attacks, and some authorities suspect the jet was fired upon and damaged by Russian antiaircraft weapons.

The Wall Street Journal cited Matt Borie, a chief intelligence officer for aviation security firm Osprey Flight Solutions, who surmised the flight "was likely shot down by a Russian military air-defense system."

"Video of the wreckage and the circumstances around the airspace security environment in southwest Russia indicates the possibility the aircraft was hit by some form of antiaircraft fire," he added.

Finger pointed at Russian antiaircraft fire

Borie's assessment was echoed by Ukrainian defense and national security official Andriy Kovalenko, who wrote in an X post, "This morning, an Embraer 190 aircraft of an Azerbaijani airline, flying from Baku to Grozny, was shot down by a Russian air defense system."

However, admitting this is inconvenient for everyone, so efforts will be made to cover it up, even the holes in the remaining parts of the aircraft. There is also video footage from inside the plane during the flight, showing punctured life vests and other damage," he continued.

"Russia should have closed the airspace over Grozny but failed to do so. The plane was damaged by the Russians and was sent to Kazakhstan instead of being urgently landed in Grozny to save lives," the official added.

Some authorities claim bird strikes, but evidence reveals shrapnel damage

In a follow-up post, Kovalenko shared pictures of some of the visible damage inside the downed aircraft and wrote, "During the flight, the fuselage was pierced, and the aircraft systems were damaged by the explosion of an air defense missile with shrapnel. Everything is well-documented and clearly captured."

Other pictures posted by users in the comments revealed similar evidence of damage to the aircraft's exterior that looked to be consistent with shrapnel from an explosion of some sort and further supported the theory that Russian antiaircraft fire had damaged the passenger jet and caused it to crash in neighboring Kazakhstan.

To be sure, the Journal and Fox News noted that some authorities, including Azerbaijan Airlines and Russian aviation officials, have claimed that the aircraft was diverted from Russia to Kazakhstan after it was struck by a flock of birds and encountered bad weather, but the photo and video evidence of the damage is far more suggestive of it being hit with shrapnel from a nearby explosion of an antiaircraft missile.

It remains to be seen whether a legitimate investigation into the incident will be conducted or if it will be covered up by theoretically plausible but unlikely excuses for what occurred.