Plane with 43 on board crashes in Afghanistan (Third Lead)

KABUL - An airplane carrying 38 passengers, including six foreigners, and five crew members crashed Monday in north Afghanistan, officials said.

The plane, operated by private airline Pamir, was on its way from northern Kunduz to the capital city of Kabul when it lost contact with the air traffic control at around 11:30 a.m. (0700 GMT) in the mountainous Hindu Kush region.

The aircraft crashed somewhere near Salang Pass between Baghlan and Parwan provinces, about 100 km from Kabul, Interior Ministry spokesman Zemarai Bashary told Xinhua.

He said that the ministry was sending a team to probe into the accident.

Rahimullah Hamid, general manager of Pamir Airways, told Xinhua that he was on way to the northern Salang area in a bid to check “an explosion site”.

Ahmad Javed Basharat, police spokesman of Baghlan province, said the plane crashed south of Salang Pass.

DPA adds:

The aircraft was carrying five crew members and 38 passengers, including six foreigners, provincial governor Mohammad Omar said.

There was one Pakistani and one Turk on board but the nationalities of the other foreigners were not known.

A spokesman for the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said they were assisting local authorities in searching for the wreckage.

Cloud and rain were hindering the search, the spokesman said, adding that two ISAF helicopters were on their way to the area.

It was thought the plane went down near the 3,300-metre Salang Pass, which connects the capital Kabul with the north of the country.