Cairo Appeal Body Returns 2015 Russian Jet Crash Victims' Families Case To Lower Court

Cairo Appeal Body Returns 2015 Russian Jet Crash Victims' Families Case to Lower Court

CAIRO (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 24th February, 2021) The Cairo court of appeal has ruled to send a lawsuit of families of people killed in the 2015 Russian Airbus A321 crash over Sinai back to a lower court, Mohamed Taher, a lawyer of the victims' families, told Sputnik.

In 2020, Mikhail Zagainov, another lawyer on the legal team, told Sputnik that an Egyptian court had rejected a compensation claim from relatives over alleged failure to prove their loved ones were aboard. Most of the lawsuits were filed against the Egyptian government, the air carrier and insurance company.

"The ruling sends the case back to a court of first instance. The ruling clearly mentions that the court of first instance did not litigate on the matter of the case. They did not even go to any details of anything that matters," Taher said.

According to the lawyer, the lower court "just dismissed the case on a formality, which was absolutely incorrect." The court, in particular, demanded that the plaintiffs provide an inheritance certificate, which does not exist in Russia, to prove family relationship with the victims.

"Now, they have to litigate it on the merits, not on the formalities. We hope it will happen very soon," Taher added.

The case, he said, is "progressing and going in the right direction right now, in favor of Russian families that lost loved ones."

"Sooner or later these families will have to be compensated," he added, noting that he represents "tens" of such lawsuits.

The Kogalymavia-operated plane en route from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to St. Petersburg crashed over the Sinai Peninsula on October 31, 2015, killing all 224 people, including 25 children, aboard. Russian intelligence deemed the crash to be a terrorist attack. The deadliest disaster in the history of Russian and Soviet aviation led to suspending passenger air traffic to Egypt. Flights resumed in early 2018 after the country bolstered airport security.

The probe into the crash is still underway.