Search on for plane crash victims' bodies

The search for the bodies of an Afghan minister and two other victims, who died in a plane crash a day earlier, continued for the second day yesterday as Pakistan navy extended the scope of the hunt up to the coastal areas.

The Pakistan navy's deep-sea divers, backed by a destroyer, a mine-sweeper, two small ships and helicopters, carried out their operations all day-long to find the major bulk of the wreckage of Cessna 402 which crashed somewhere 35 nautical miles west of Karachi.

Eight people were killed in the crash including Afghanistan's Minister for Petroleum and Mines Juma Mohammed Mohammedi. The crash victims, included Sun Chansheng, the chief executive of the Chinese firm MCC Resource Development Co and four other Afghan officials.

Two Pakistanis, including the pilot, were also killed. "From the deep sea, we have now extended our search to the coastal areas as well hoping to find the bodies there," navy spokesman Comman-der Roshan Khayal said.

On Monday, Pakistan navy divers recovered the bodies of three Afghans and two Pakistanis.

The bodies of Afghans have been identified as of Ahmed Ratib Aloomi, an adviser at Afghanistan's petroleum ministry, Fahad Ahad, who was a director in the ministry and Ameen Sadiq, an engineer, said Mohammed Ragib Piyasa, an official of the Afghan COnsulate in Karachi.

But the bodies of minister, another Afghan and the Chinese executive are still missing, the Pakistan navy and Afghan officials said.

Gul-e-Rana, another official, said Afghanistan's charge de affairs Rehmatullah Musa Ghazi arrived in Karachi to recognise the bodies. "But so far no decision has been taken when the bodies would be flown home," she said.

Pakistan's Civil Aviation Authority has ordered an inquiry into the incident. A senior official of the authority said that Afghan authorities have asked Pakistan not to carry out autopsy of the Afghan nationals, which would make the investigations task a little more difficult.

The twin-propeller Cessna does not have a black box, and officials said eye-witness account, wreckage and autopsy of bodies were the main pieces of evidence. The investigations are likely to take several months and could stretch up to one year in line with the international civil aviation laws.

Khayal said bodies of victims who did not tie their seat-belts floated out of the wreckage and found soon after the crash. But the remaining three are most likely still tied to the seat-belts, he said.

"The recovered bodies are not mutilated. They died on impact," he said. "The plane ditched from a height of 7,000 feet and plunged into the seat," Khayal said. "It broke into two pieces on impact."

The Cessna flew from Karachi at 8.10 am and lost contact with the control tower at around 8.35 am.

Pakistan's best-known social welfare and relief group, the Edhi Welfare Foundation, owned the aircraft. Abdul Sattar Edhi, the chief of the organisation, said the plane was well-maintained and in perfect condition.

"One of its engines completed 6,000 flying hours, while the other only 350," he said. "The Civil Aviation Authority report would tell what went wrong with the plane."

Pakistan navy and Civil Aviation Authority officials said most likely the plane crashed due to a technical fault, brushing aside speculations that it could had been hit by any object from outside. "The plane was 24 nautical miles from the closest firing range of the Pakistan navy, which was not active that day," Khayal said.

The Afghan delegation was travelling to a copper and gold mining project being run by a Chinese firm in Saindak in Pakistan's Baluchistan province. Mohammedi was interested in the transfer of modern mining technology to Afghanistan and was going there to observe the Chinese technology at the end of his official visit to Pakistan.

The Afghan delegation discussed a multi-billion natural gas pipeline project for the supply of gas from the Central Asian state of Turkmenistan to Pakistan via Afghanistan.

This was Pakistan's second fatal air crash in less than a week. Last Thursday, the Pakistan air force chief Marshal Mushaf Ali Mir, his wife and several senior officials died when their plane slammed in to a mountain near Kohat, a city in the North-West Frontier Province.