AlfaStrakhovanie, a leading insurance company in Russia, has completed the payment of insurance compensation under the aviation hull insurance for the Embraer 190 aircraft of Azerbaijan Airlines (AZAL) that crashed near Aktau.
The insurance company has also already begun payments to passengers, as per Ilya Kabachnik, the Deputy CEO of the company for aviation and space insurance.
Ilya Kabachnik explained that the insurer did not have to wait for the official investigation into the plane crash to be completed:
"Although the investigation into the crash is ongoing, we have enough information to organize payments. The fact of the plane's death is important to us, and there is no doubt about it. Since the risks of war and terrorism were also insured, the airline receives compensation in any case."
The Embraer 190 aircraft and the carrier's liability to passengers were insured by AlfaStrakhovanie.
Reports suggest that the main part of the risk was reinsured by the Russian National Reinsurance Company (RNRC).
Worth noting here, the agreement between AlfaStrakhovanie and AZAL provides for the payments under the Russian law on compulsory civil liability insurance of the carrier (CCL).
However, the carriage of passengers on the Baku-Grozny flight is regulated by the Montreal Convention of 1999, which was ratified by both Azerbaijan and Russia.
The full insurance amount for the aircraft was paid in February, but the exact amount of the payment was not disclosed.
The company began making insurance payments to passengers and their legal representatives in January 2025, and this process continues.
The limits of payments for damage to life and health under this law are two million rubles (10 million tenge). Compensations can be paid promptly on the basis of submitted documents.
As for damage to third parties on the ground, no claims have been filed yet.
"If such claims appear, we will work with them in the established order together with the airline," Kabachnik added.
The crash of the Embraer of AZAL Airlines, which was flying from Baku to Grozny, occurred on December 25, 2024. The plane headed to Aktau after two unsuccessful attempts to land in Grozny.
Not reaching the Kazakh airport by about 5 km, it crashed. There were 67 people on board the plane (42 citizens of Azerbaijan, 16 of Russia, 6 of Kazakhstan, 3 of Kyrgyzstan), 38 of them died.
On December 30 last year, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) called for a thorough and impartial investigation into the incident.
On February 4 this year, the Ministry of Transport of the Republic of Kazakhstan published a preliminary report on the investigation of the aviation accident.
In December last year, Russian President Putin apologized to his Azerbaijani counterpart for what he called a “tragic incident” following the crash of an Azerbaijani Airlines Embraer 190 aircraft in Kazakhstan, however he stopped short of acknowledging that Moscow was responsible for the crash.
In the telephone conversation with the Azerbaijani president, Putin "apologized for the fact that the tragic incident occurred in Russian airspace and once again expressed his deepest and most sincere condolences to the families of the victims and wished a speedy recovery to the injured."
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