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It was not immediately clear what caused the crash. Ukraine’s new President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed his condolences and tasked newly-appointed general staff chief Ruslan Khomchak with overseeing the investigation. “Our army should not be losing people during games and drills,” the 41-year-old president was quoted as saying by his office.
Zelensky, a former comedian, swept last month’s presidential election in a rebuke to the establishment fuelled by popular anger over war with Russian-backed separatists and social injustice. The conflict against Russia-backed insurgents in the east has claimed some 13,000 lives since 2014.