"Our C-130 military cargo plane, which took off from Azerbaijan to return home, has crashed at the Georgia-Azerbaijan border," the ministry said on X, indicating a search and rescue operation was taking place but without saying whether there were any casualties or how many people were on board.

In a statement, Georgia's interior ministry confirmed the crash of "a Turkish military aircraft" that was flying to Turkey, saying it went down "about five kilometres from Georgia's state border" with Azerbaijan.

It said an investigation had been opened.

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