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| Round 2 of Cotonou crash
investigations winds up Findings still confidential as responsibility for Christmas Day accident still undetermined Nayla Assaf Daily Star staff The Lebanese judiciary completed over the weekend the second round of investigations pertaining to the Cotonou plane crash which took the lives of at least 85 Lebanese passengers on Christmas Day. However, the outcome of investigations have not been made public yet as responsibilities are still unclear. On Saturday, State Prosecutor Adnan Addoum said he was still waiting to receive the official report to be released by the Guinean authorities via Interpol, the Transport Ministry or any other official authority that determines the source of the crash of the Union des Transports Africains (UTA) plane that killed at least 139 people. The head of the Central Criminal Investigation Department, Colonel Elias Saadeh, received the depositions of Beirut International Airport (BIA) investment department head Ziad Baba and of one of the plane’s owners, Ahmed Khazem, who had been prevented from leaving the country by order from Addoum. On Monday, Saadeh will interrogate the UTA plane’s Palestinian-American owner, Imad Saba, the UTA delegate at BIA, Hatem Zebian, plane technician Hussein Timany, and Edward Ziloshki, an expert who had conducted a prior report on the plane. He will also hear the deposition of the director of civil aviation, Hamdi Shawq. On Friday, the Guinean Transport Minister told the press the UTA plane had been sold to the Guinean-based company by the Afghan national carrier, Ariana Afghan Airlines. Despite reports the plane had been purchased by UTA from an American company in Sharjah, Cellou Dalein Diallo reported that the Boeing 727-200, which was originally part of the American Airlines fleet, had been sold by Ariana to UTA last year. According to Diallo, the plane had a certificate of airworthiness valid until April 2004 and was insured by a British-based company. Diallo added that the plane was not due for servicing, as it was last serviced in the United States three years ago. He said the aircraft met “all the normal conditions for carrying out commercial flights, adding “there had not been any casualness nor complacency in the issuing of the license.” Also on Friday, the Committee of Sworn Plane Experts in Lebanon urged for tighter technical control on planes and for holding training sessions for technicians. On Sunday, Higher Shiite Council vice-president Abdel-Amir Qabalan urged the state to protect Lebanese expatriates and “to translate words into action.” In a letter addressed to the parents of the deceased Qabalan said the loss “was hard on the whole nation.” The villages of Kharayeb, Zibdin and Dibbin held the one-week memorial for the victims of the plane crash on Sunday. In Kharayeb, the Amal Movement held a ceremony in honor of the eight victims from the village. It was attended by Energy and Water Resources Minister Ayoub Humayed, representing Speaker Nabih Berri and Agriculture Minister Ali Hassan Khalil in addition to a wide range of MPs from the region. On Saturday, the Gathering of Popular Committees and Leagues asked that the names of the owners of the company and of the company in charge of maintenance be made public. |
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