Crews were hoping to remove the bodies of 11 military personnel Saturday, a day after their U.N. surveillance plane crashed in Haiti, killing everyone on board. Five of the victims belonged to the Jordanian army.
The Uruguayan CASA212 aircraft went down Friday afternoon near the border with the Dominican Republic, 45 kilometers from the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, according to U.N. spokeswoman Michele Montas in New York, cited by the AP. "The aircraft was on a regular reconnaissance flight," she said in a statement.
The other victims were Uruguayan serving with the 9,000-strong U.N. peacekeeping force that has been in Haiti since 2004. According to Petra news agency, the Jordanian dead are: Colonel Ibrahim Obaidullah Humeidan Mawajdeh, Lt. Colonel Jihad Semrein Hussein, Civil Defense Major Ibrahim Mohamed Rizeq Shurman, 1st Lt. Bilal Ahmed Rashed Abu Hujeila and 1st Warrant Officer Amer Mahmoud Abdullah Rawashded.
The United Nations has begun an investigation, Montas said.
© 2009 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
