General Zia-ul-Haq’s plane crash due to mechanical problem: report

Sunday, August 17, 2008 at 8:45 am

LONDON: The plane crash in Bahawalpur desert twenty years ago which killed former Pakistan President General Zia-ul-Haq along with the US Ambassador Arnold Raphael and spawned several conspiracies theories has now been blamed on the mechanical problem, says a report in a foreign newspaper.

According to the daily, American, Soviet, Indian and even Israeli intelligence agents were among those blamed for sabotaging the PAF C-130 Hercules plane.

The daily has uncovered a far less complicated explanation. According to US investigators, a mechanical problem, known to be relatively common with the C-130 military transport aircraft, was to blame.

“There were a lot of conspiracy theories and there still are, understandably in that part of the world,” Robert Oakley, who took over as US Ambassador to Pakistan after the crash and helped to handle the politically fraught investigation, told newspaper. “

Washington sent a team of US Air Force officers to assist the Pakistanis in the investigation. The two sides reached sharply different conclusions.