The flight safety center under the aegis of the International Civil Aviation Organization has apologized for the search on a plane of the Russian flagship air carrier Aeroflot at a London airport in late March, Russian transport minister Maxim Sokolov said on Friday, TASS reports.
When asked by reporters whether the center has explained reasons for the move, the minister replied: "yes, it did. It even apologized. It was the flight safety center under the ICAO aegis, operating in the UK."
Aeroflot executives said on March 30 that the UK authorities had searched a plane, bound to perform a return flight SU2583 from London to Moscow, without providing any explanations for their actions. In violation of the effective international rules, the captain of the jet was locked in the cockpit. The airline said the search fully ran counter to the international practice for such operations.
The Russian embassy in the UK has sent a note to the UK Foreign Office, demanding explanations for what it described as an outright provocation by the British authorities. Russia’s transportation ministry earlier said that the Russian coordination center on air safety will request UK authorities about reasons for the move.