At least 16 dead in Slovak military plane crash

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
A Slovak military plane returning from Kosovo crashed in a mountainous region of northeastern Hungary, killing at least 16 of the more than 40 people on board, a spokesman for the national disaster service said. At least one survivor was found at the site of Thursday's crash near the Slovak border, added spokesman Tibor Dobson. Firefighters were on the scene and rescuers continued to search, the government said. In Kosovo, a NATO officer who was not authorized to speak on the record said the plane carried Slovak soldiers serving in the NATO-led peacekeeping force there, who were returning to Slovakia after six months' duty in the province. About 100 Slovak troops serve in a battalion that patrols the boundary between Kosovo and Serbia. Slovakia's Prime Minister Mikulas Dzurinda said there were 43 people on the plane, 28 of them soldiers, the Slovak news agency TASR reported.