Search ends for Afghan plane dead

Afghan authorities have completed their search for the bodies of more than 100 people who died last month when an airliner slammed into a mountain during a snowstorm, an official said today.

Defence Ministry spokesman Mohammed Zahir Azimi also said the final death toll from the February 3 crash could also rise to 106 – two more than originally announced – because one or two small children were also feared among the passengers.

“They were only marked by an ’x’ on the passenger list,” Azimi told a news conference.

Afghan troops returned to their barracks on Saturday after weeks of searching for the remains of the up to 98 passengers and eight crew, including more than 20 foreigners, when the Boeing 737 struck a snowy peak 20 miles east of the capital Kabul.

Azimi said that authorities believed they had recovered remains of all the victims, but that identifying them was proving very difficult.

The bodies of five Afghan victims were handed over to relatives at a hospital in Kabul yesterday, bringing the total released so far to 16. DNA samples from dozens more have been sent to Italy for testing. The first results are expected next week.

The foreign passengers included nine Turks, six Americans, three Italians and one Iranian. A Canadian citizen and several Russians were believed to be among the six-strong crew.

American investigators have joined the effort to find out why the plane, operated by private Afghan airline Kam Air, crashed in Afghanistan’s worst air disaster.

The plane went down in a blizzard after the pilot approached Kabul airport on a flight from the western city of Herat. The data recorder has been recovered, but the voice recorder has yet to be located.