Ten killed in Afghanistan cargo plane crash

An ageing cargo plane carrying communications equipment for the US-led coalition in Afghanistan slammed into mountains near the capital Kabul today, killing up to 10 people.

The nationalities of the ten were not immediately known, said Lt. Col. Cristoni Riccar, a spokesman for a Nato-led peacekeeping force.

But Aijaz Faizi, manager of Pakistan-based Royal Airlines, which owns the 20-year-old Russian-made Ilyushin 76, said only eight were on the aircraft: five Russians, two Ukrainians and a Pakistani.

An Afghan police commander at the crash site near Bagram, the US-led coalition's headquarters in Afghanistan, said no one survived.

“We have recovered five bodies. They are in many pieces,” Ghulam Rasool said.

Bad weather may have played a role in the crash, the commander said as he held up a piece of the wreckage.

Clouds hung low over the area as rescuers searched for bodies.

Pieces of the wreckage were still smoking hours after the crash and some children were carrying away chunks of the plane's fuselage.