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Islamabad, Ambassadors of the Philippines and Norway and at least five others were killed after a Pakistani military helicopter carrying 11 foreigners and six Pakistan nationals on Friday crashed into a school in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir’s Gilgit-Baltistan in the north.
The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has claimed responsibility for the incident and said Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was the target, even while the Paskistan Army ruled out the possibility of any terrorist or subversive activity in the crash.
Leif H Larsen, the Norwegian envoy, Domingo D Lucenario Jr of the Philippines, and the wives of the Malaysian and Indonesian ambassadors, besides two army pilots and a Pakistan national were killed when the Mi-17 chopper caught fire and crashed into a school that had children inside at the time while trying to make an emergency landing in Naltar valley. The crash set the school building ablaze, according to initial reports.
“Two pilots and four foreigners, including ambassadors of Philippine, Norway and wives of Malaysian and Indonesian ambassador were killed,” military spokesman Major General Asim Saleem Bajwa had initially tweeted said. An update from Bajwa said fatalities had mounted to seven, with a Pakistan national also losing his life in the crash.
Marcel de Vink, the Ambassador of Netherlands, and Andrzej Ananiczolish, the Ambassador of Poland, were also injured in the crash, Bajwa updated on Twitter.
Bajwa said that three Mi-17 military helicopters were carrying several diplomats to Gilgit-Baltistan in PoK, where Sharif was to address a ceremony.
“The helicopter was shot down by an anti-aircraft missile, killing pilots and many foreign ambassadors. A special group of Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan had prepared a special plan to target Nawaz Sharif during his visit but he survived because he was travelling in another helicopter,” according to a statement in Urdu emailed by the TTP’s main spokesman Muhammad Khorasani. While the claim could not be independently verified, but the Gilgit-Baltistan region is not known to be the militant outfit’s stronghold. However, Bajwa told the Dawn that the helicopter crashed due to a technical fault.
“Two of the helicopters landed safely but the third one crashed and caught fire,” Bajwa said.
A board of inquiry has been set up to investigate the cause of the crash, he said.
Sharif was scheduled to visit the region to inaugurate two projects. His plane was already airborne but it was diverted to Islamabad following the incident.
The Prime Minister “expressed deep grief and sorrow” over the incident and declared a day’s mourning, according to a statement issued by his office.
The crash, the worst since 2012 when a civilian 737 went down in Islamabad killing 130 people, was also reminiscent of the one in 1988 that killed then military-ruler General Zia-ul-Haq as well as then US ambassador Arnold Raphel.
According to the Express Tribune, the High Commissioners of South Africa and Indonesia have also been injured in Friday’s crash.
The trip was mainly organised to boost tourism to the area, but diplomats were expected to hold several high-level meetings, including one with the Gilgit-Baltistan chief minister Syed Mehdi Shah.
The Dawn report said that the injured have been taken to the emergency ward of the Combined Military Hospital in Gilgit, citing hospital officials.
Pakistan Air Force has arranged to bring the bodies of the ambassadors and the wives of two other envoys to Islamabad, it said.
The Foreign Office in Islamabad has informed the respective governments about the incident.
