US blames Russian firm for goof-up

New Delhi: According to sources, the US embassy in New Delhi has been profusely apologetic ever since the Indian air traffic controllers forced an AN-124 transport aircraft chartered by the US military to land in Mumbai. From the moment the aircraft landed in Mumbai, the US mission has been using various contact points to get the aircraft released.
The American interlocutors have placed the blame, for disguising the aircraft carrying military cargo as a civilian aircraft, on the Russian firm. The US military had hired a Russian firm, Volga-Dnepr Airlines, to transport military cargo from Diego Garcia to Kandahar.
A senior MOD source said that if the aircraft pilot had disclosed they were carrying military cargo, then "they would have had to disclose details of the cargo they are carrying, based on which we would have had to decide whether to allow the flight into our airspace." The fear of India refusing flight rights over its airspace could have been the reason for not disclosing the flight details, sources believe. They are also surprised that the aircraft was flying over India and not over Pakistan, on its way to Afghanistan.
Meanwhile, even as the Indian authorities were forcing the AN-124 aircraft to land in Mumbai, another aircraft of the same make was getting ready to take off from Diego Garcia for Kandahar. That aircraft, too, had reported itself as a civilian aircraft. "We warned them not take off, and told them that if they came over Indian airspace we would force-land them too," a senior MOD source said.
21/06/09 Josy Joseph / Daily News & Analysis

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Categories: Airports Jun 2009, Foreign Jun 2009, Safety Jun 2009