WFP: Juba-bound Russian helicopter crashes in Ethiopia
By Tesfa-Alem Tekle
August 1, 2013 (ADDIS ABABA) – The UN World Food Program (WFP) office in Ethiopia on Thursday has dismissed a report by Associated Press alleging that a helicopter that crashed in Ethiopia on Wednesday belonged to WFP and had been carrying UN personnel on board.
The helicopter with four people, including two pilots on board was en route to Juba from Djibouti before it came down in Debrezeit town, some 45 kilometres south of the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.
The helicopter had been contracted to join operations as part of the UN’s Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), but the official said that WFP did not consider that the helicopter was flying under a UN mandate as it had not yet reached its contracted area of operation.
“The helicopter was not under the authority of UN humanitarian air transit. It was on a positioning flight”, she said, adding that only the Russian company’s crew members were on board at the time of the incident.
She stressed that information circulated on international news wires was incorrect, but declined to disclose any further details either on the Russian company involved or the circumstances of the crash.
Citing to Ethiopia’s ministry of foreign affairs spokesman, Dina Mufti, the US News Agency, however, said there were “multiple injuries” after the incident.
The Russian company – PANH Helicopters – originally sent two helicopters which were to be deployed in South Sudan’s eastern Jonglei state, where armed conflict is forcing thousands to flee to neighbouring countries.
The UN refugee agency (UNHCR) recently said that some 5,000 South Sudanese from Jonglei’s Pibor county had arrived in western Ethiopia since last May.
(ST)