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Iraqi Kurdistan: Sulaimaniyah airport
international dismisses report of attack on Swedish
airliner
11.8.2007
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August 11, 2007
Sulaimaniyah, Kurdistan Region (Iraq), --
Aviation officials from Iraq's Kurdistan region on
Saturday dismissed reports that a Swedish airliner
had been targeted by a missile as it took off with
130 passengers on board.
According to the Swedish TT news agency, the pilots
of a Nordic Airways MD-83 jet saw flashes in the sky
on Thursday as they took off from Sulaimaniyah in
autonomous region of Kurdistan (northern Iraq) and
feared they may be under attack.
But the chairman of the Sulaimaniyah International
Airport Authority, Kamaran Ahmed, said a local
investigation found no evidence that a missile was
fired and blamed the scare on bright lights being
used on the ground. |
Nordic Airways |
"We think that the object that had been noticed by
the pilot 'suspiciously' was a special type of 'high
intensity lighting projector' mounted on vehicles
usually used by hunters in the area," he said, in a
statement in English.
The beam could also have been from a light used by
farmers during a rush to harvest in the region, the
statement added, while insisting that security
forces had searched a 30-kilometre (18-mile)
diameter area around the airport.
The Kurdish regional government also said there was
no reason to worry.
"No plane at the Sulaimaniyah International Airport
has come under attack. This is untrue and baseless
news," its spokesman Khalid Saleh said.
Northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region is proud
that it has managed to escape the worst of the
violence that has gripped the centre and south of
the country since the US-led liberation of March
2003.
The mountainous region has opened air links to
several European and regional destinations and
launched an international advertising drive designed
to lure tourists and investors to Sulaimaniyah and
its capital Erbil.
Nordic flies from Stockholm to Sulaimaniyah once a
week.
AFP
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