ak ssz to all of the planes. they are allowing them to go through what they need to go through and whatever they need to go through to feel comfortable, but in spite of that, they are not going to be allowing hold luggage. you have a sense that the officials are reeling, a a nd ft the bbc report and then a statement from putin and the fsb, and none of that, the egyptians say was communicated to them bilaterally before it was announced. there is a real worry that you feel storm cloud gathering in the country of a country seen as a real partner in terms of the security cooperation and the broader issue of terror around the world is blind sided in its own backyard and the backdrop of all of this is the confusion among t amongst the tourists. if they could not handle the tense of thousands of brits and europeans that should have been out ohere nowadays, how do they handle the tens of thousands of russians on top of it. people are worried and they are starting to feel quite scared.
russian president vladimir putin he has just announced that he s suspending all russian flights into egypt until the cause of that crash is determined, and a new report out saying that a bomb may have been planted in the cargo hold right before takeoff. the bbc now reporting that british intelligence suggests than explosive device could have been smuggled on board by workers at the sharm el sheikh airport. let s get straight to our senior international correspondent there at the airport, at sharm el sheikh. what are you learning? reporter: well, john, president putin s statements won t be quieting any of those concerns about what exactly happened to that plane before it took to the air. the bbc is reporting from british investigators that there was a fundamental security lapse that allowed a bomb to be put in the hold. and what s giving credence to that broader theory is that for those who are traveling back to the uk, those very lucky few who are being told that they will be sent
crash but hasn t yet produced any evidence to prove they did it. we have the story covered from all angles. let s start in london with nbc s keir simmons who s at number 10 downing street where hours ago british prime minister david cameron met with prime minister cici. reporter: what i ve been hearing is that the british holiday vacationers were coming back from sharm el sheikh will not be allowed to bring their hold luggage with them. they will only be allowed to bring hand luggage on those flights back. thousands of those vacationers returning back to the u.k. now the obvious next question to that official was, well, does that point to where you think there was a weakness on the flight? the official would not answer that question, but you have to ask the question, if the british think that even now it is not sensible for passengers to fly back with their hold luggage, then that raises the alert about how worried they are about
security at sharm elshake airport, in particular that screening of hold luggage. you re talking about the checked luggage, yeah, kier? sorry. reporter: that s right. you re using the british term, the checked luggage that goes under the plane? reporter: correct. exactly. the checked luggage. the luggage that people check into a flight, don t carry with them. you ll only be allowed to bring their carry on luggage with them on the flight. at the same time, the british making clear that this was a bomb, this is what the british prime minister had to say a little earlier today. look, we cannot be certain that the russian airliner was brought down by a terrorist bonl, but it looks increasingly likely that that was the case. i act on the intelligence. reporter: at the same time now we ve seen the diplomatic tectonic plates rubbing together. let me list for you the different things that have been said. the chairman of the senate
has to make sure they don t have that same loophole or easy trap door. however, if isis has discovered some sort of trick or way around all the airport security, that s a much more serious matter. to guf you an idea of what s happening at the moment, all the planes, monarch, thompson, they are about to start e evacuating the british people from the airport, but under some extraordinarily difficult circumstances. all your luggage, all your hold luggage is going to be sent separately and you re only going to be allowed one carry-on bag on the aircraft and if it s too much carry-on luggage, it won t just go in the hold, it will be sent with everything else. so the warning to passengers is