Crash heightens air alerts

2004-01-03 17:19

As US terror warnings disrupted international air travel for a third day on Saturday, officials said a Red Sea plane crash that raised further fears of a terrorist attack was probably an accident.

All eyes turned towards Egypt on Saturday, when a plane crashed into the Red Sea shortly after take-off, killing all of the 135 mostly French tourists and 13 crew on board, according to a preliminary toll.

But Egyptian and later French officials said the crash was in all likelihood accidental in nature - rather than a deliberate attack.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher ruled out terrorism as a possible cause, saying the crash "is absolutely not the result of a terrorist act".

"We are largely working on the theory that this was an accident," French Transport Minister Gilles de Robien told reporters. "Nothing indicates that there could have been any other cause."

British Airways resumed a normal service between London and Washington on Saturday after grounding BA flight 223 to Washington for two days running, amid speculation about a September 11-style attack on the US capital.

The mid-afternoon flight to Washington was to take off as normal at 15:05 GMT, but BA announced it was cancelling a daily flight to the Saudi capital Riyadh until further notice, due to security concerns.

Saturday's BA flight 263 from London to Riyadh was cancelled, along with the return flight on Sunday. The airline said it had not yet decided whether to operate Monday's flight. Other BA flights were operating as normal.

Terror suspect

Reports emerged on Saturday that a terrorist suspect had tried to board one of the BA flights to Washington before it was cancelled.

In all, seven flights headed for the United States - three from France, two from Britain and two from Mexico - have been cancelled since the US government heightened its nationwide terror alert on December 21.

Four other flights - two from Mexico City and two from New York to Paris - were delayed on Friday because of US security concerns.

US Under Secretary for Border and Transportation Security Asa Hutchinson defended the US government's role in the flight disruption, although she said it may never be known if a terrorist attack had been stopped. Right decisions

"We made the right decisions," he said, adding that the decisions to halt the flights were "based on specific intelligence concerns that we have."

Suited-up jet fighter pilots remained on high alert Saturday at bases across the United States, ready to intercept - and shoot down if necessary - any hijacked commercial airliners, according to officials.

US media reported that military jets had also been used to escort at least two Air France jets on flights to Los Angeles this week.

Three flights by the carrier to Los Angeles on December 24 and 25 were cancelled due to US security concerns about names on the passenger lists. The FBI later said none of the passengers presented a threat.

- SAPA