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Azerbaijan demands clarification over crew members' fate in Afghanistan cargo plane crash

Business Materials 19 July 2011 12:57 (UTC +04:00)
An Azerbaijani commission investigating the causes of the Azerbaijani plane which crashed in Afghanistan has appealed to the Afghan side with demands to clarify the fate of the aircraft's crewmembers, commission member and advisor to the Silk Way Airlines Director Adil Gasimov told Trend.
Azerbaijan demands clarification over crew members' fate in Afghanistan cargo plane crash

Azerbaijan, Baku, July 19 / Trend S.Aliyev /

An Azerbaijani commission investigating the causes of the Azerbaijani plane which crashed in Afghanistan has appealed to the Afghan side with demands to clarify the fate of the aircraft's crewmembers, commission member and advisor to the Silk Way Airlines Director Adil Gasimov told Trend.

Earlier, the Afghan side announced the discovery of one of the two flight data recorders (black boxes) of the Azerbaijani plane. This device records what occurs during the flight. Data obtained after the decoding can reveal more information about the possible causes of the crash.

Gasimov said that according to international conventions, the country where the incident occurs must carry out investigations about the accident. In this case, Afghanistan will investigate the crash. Azerbaijan sent a proposal to transfer the "black box" to the Interstate Aviation Committee in Moscow, where necessary equipment and expertise is available to decrypt the data. The aircraft was also manufactured in Russia.

Regardless, the black box will be opened with Azerbaijani and Afghan participation, as well as with representatives of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Five members of the nine-person crew on the "Azerbaijan Airlines" cargo aircraft were Azerbaijani citizens. The other victims were Uzbek citizens, the ambassador said. All crew members of the "Azerbaijan Airlines" cargo aircraft were killed.

Nine crew members and a total of 18 tons of cargo were onboard the plane which was en route from Baku to Bagram. The plane picked up its cargo at the Baku Heydar Aliyev International Airport and took off at 21:26 (local time).

The plane was built in 2005 with a carrying capacity of 40 tons and passed a full inspection in February 2011. It passed the subsequent inspection in June 2011.

The Azerbaijani commission investigating the causes of the Azerbaijani plane crash in Afghanistan stated that among the primary explanations for the plane crash is that the "Taliban shot down it".

"The version that the Taliban shot down the Azerbaijani cargo plane in Afghanistan is one of the primary theories," Deputy Director General of Azerbaijan Airlines Ilham Amirov said at a news conference.

Azerbaijan has officially sent a second note to the Afghan Foreign Ministry for assistance in the delivery of the crew members' dead bodies.

The commission members, who are in Kabul, still could not get to the crash site due to the difficult situation there

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