UN plane crashes in Haiti; eleven dead

Saturday, October 10, 2009

A plane belonging to the United Nations has crashed in Haiti, reports said. The UN says that all on board the plane have been killed.

The plane, a CASA C-212 Aviocar, crashed on Friday afternoon about 45 kilometres from the country's capital of Port-au-Prince, near the border with the Dominican Republic.

"The aircraft was on a regular reconnaissance flight," said UN spokeswoman Michele Montas in a statement.

All bodies were found at the crash site, the UN said, and the victims were military personnel from Uruguay and Jordan.

The plane belonged to the Uruguayan contingent of MINUSTAH, a 9,000-strong UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti. It has been in the country since 2004.

An investigation into the cause of the incident has been launched by the UN.


Sources