By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Libya says British authorities have agreed to analyse the black box from a plane crash in Turkey on December 23, in which a Libyan military delegation, including the head of its army was killed.
General Mohammed al-Haddad and four aides died after a visit to Ankara, with Turkish officials saying an electrical failure caused their Falcon 50 jet to crash shortly after takeoff.
Three crew members, two of them French nationals, were also killed.
The aircraft’s black box flight recorder was found on farmland near the crash site.
“We coordinated directly with Britain for the analysis” of the black box, Mohamed al-Chahoubi, transport minister in the Government of National Unity (GNU), said at a press conference in Tripoli.
The late General Haddad was very popular in Libya despite deep divisions between west and east.
The North African country has been split since a NATO-backed revolt toppled and killed longtime leader Moamer Gaddafi in 2011.
Haddad was chief of staff for the internationally recognised GNU, which controls the west. The east is run by military ruler Khalifa Haftar.
Chahoubi told AFP a request for the analysis was “made to Germany, which demanded France’s assistance” to examine the aircraft’s flight recorders.
“However, the Chicago Convention stipulates that the country analysing the black box must be neutral,” he said.
“Since France is a manufacturer of the aircraft and the crew was French, it is not qualified to participate. The United Kingdom, on the other hand, was accepted by Libya and Turkey.”
After meeting the British ambassador to Tripoli on Tuesday, Foreign Minister Taher al-Baour said a joint request had been submitted by Libya and Turkey to Britain “to obtain technical and legal support for the analysis of the black box”.
Chahoubi at a press briefing on Thursday said that Britain “announced its agreement, in coordination with the Libyan Ministry of Transport and the Turkish authorities”.
He said it was not yet possible to say how long it would take to retrieve the flight data, as this depended on the state of the black box.
“The findings will be made public once they are known,” Chahoubi said, warning against “false information” and urging the public not to pay attention to rumours.
