Kiev - Ukraine inched closer yesterday to conceding that one of its missiles might have blown up a Russian airliner, but President Leonid Kuchma stepped into a diplomatic minefield by saying "bigger mistakes have been made".
Mr Kuchma said he would accept the findings from a Russian investigation into last Thursday's crash. Russian experts have said they found what appeared to be missile parts among the wreckage of the Tupolev Tu-154. The plane exploded over the Black Sea last week, killing all 78 on board near a site where the Ukraine military was holding live missile exercises. Most of the passengers were Russian-born Israelis flying from Tel Aviv to Novosibirsk in Siberia.
Mr Kuchma sought to play down the magnitude of the error, should the investigation find his military at fault. "We should not make a tragedy out of matters if it was a mistake. Bigger mistakes have been made,"Mr Kchma said. But a spokesman for the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr Ariel Sharon, said Israel viewed the plane's destruction as a major tragedy.