Film purportedly showing Russians shooting Polish crash survivors surfaces
May 16th, 2010 - 2:18 pm ICT by ANILondon, May 16 (ANI): Sensational footage apparently showing Russian soldiers shooting survivors of the air crash that obliterated most of Poland’s top-brass, including President Kaczynski and the three military chiefs, has surfaced.
The blurred film clip was recorded on a mobile phone is now being studied by Polish and Russian experts to determine its authenticity. There have been claims that the clip is a deliberate attempt at sullying Moscow.
The film was initially shown on Rossiya-24 TV two days after the Tupolev Tu-154 plane crashed near Smolensk military airport in Russia on April 10, killing 96 people on board. The clip did not appear to include shooting sounds now heard on the Internet version, the Daily Express reports.
There is also shouting heard in Russian to “kill” survivors on the web clip, which was not on the earlier footage.
The TV station denied masking any gunfire and said they merely edited out a swear word.
Last night, Russian officials confirmed they had interviewed the man who allegedly made the film. He was not named, nor has he spoken in public about whether he heard gunfire, the report said.
An aviation expert said: “The way this footage has spread on the web means it is essential to get answers on which version of the footage has been altered.
“What is clear is the scenes shown on several versions of the film are from this crash site.”
Investigators are not ruling out the possibility of the bullets of the President’s armed guards exploding at the crash site. Seven pistols were recovered from the wreckage. (ANI)
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Tags: air crash, armed guards, aviation expert, crash site, crash survivors, deliberate attempt, film clip, gunfire, internet version, kaczynski, military airport, military chiefs, russian experts, russian officials, russian soldiers, smolensk, top brass, tupolev, web clip, wreckage