KHARTOUM, 19 November 2003 — A Sudanese cargo plane caught fire and exploded while preparing to land at a southern airport, killing all 13 people aboard, the airline’s chief said yesterday. Mohamed Abdel Qadir, general manager of Saria Airlines, said “the plane caught fire and exploded” in an apparent accident as it approached Wau airport late Monday afternoon on a flight from the capital Khartoum.
Civil aviation investigators had arrived yesterday at the scene where the main body of the Antonov 12 was found about four kilometers from the airport, Abdel Qadir told AFP. Among the dead were the four Armenians, a Russian and an Uzbek who flew the Russian-made plane, he said earlier on state-run Omdurman Radio. In Moscow, the Foreign Ministry identified the crew as four Armenians and two Uzbeks.
The head of the private Khartoum-based airline added that all the others on board also died: three security officials, a Bank of Sudan official, a Saria engineer, a policeman and a military policeman. Abdel Qadir said the plane was carrying commercial foods and an unspecified sum of money sent from the central Bank of Sudan to a local branch.
He later told AFP by telephone that “the impression we had from the outset and until now was that it was an accident,” doubting it was caused by some kind of attack. The independent Al-Sahafa daily quoted witnesses as saying the plane was on fire in the air before it exploded and fell to the ground.
Wau, in Bahr Al-Ghazal state, is one of the main government-held cities in southern Sudan, but there have been no reports of fighting for at least a year with the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army. SPLA spokesman George Garang told AFP by telephone in Nairobi that rebel forces had nothing to do with the incident and that “the crash is purely an accident.
“We are still observing a strict cease-fire and therefore our forces, which are some 36 kilometers south of Wau, were not involved in the accident,” Garang said.
In another development, a Sudanese editor said he would appeal against an order to suspend publication of his newspaper which the authorities have accused of publishing articles that threatened the state. The independent Al-Ayyam daily was suspended from publication on Monday by the higher prosecutor of crimes against the state until investigations of cases filed against it are completed.
“I met the higher prosecutor ... and he said our newspaper has been publishing dangerous articles which are a threat to the safety of the state,” editor Mahjoub Muhammad Salih told Reuters.
Sudanese President Omar Bashir issued a decree in August lifting censorship of newspapers by the security service. Journalists said three newspapers have been suspended since then, but have since resumed publication.
