Hiiraan Online
Friday, February 5, 2016
MOGADISHU (HOL) – As Somali authorities continue an investigation into the cause of a blast that opened a gaping on a plane’s side on Tuesday, mystery deepened as the airline company’s executives and Somali authorities try to control the information related to the incident.
Mohamed Ibrahim Yasin, the executive director of Daallo Airlines said his company was expecting a comprehensive result from the on-going investigation in two days’ time, declining to give further details.
“The investigation is progressing, and no conclusion has so far been made.” He said in an interview with the BBC Somali Service Thursday.
He said that the airline company has suspended all its regular flights to Mogadishu after the incident; however, He declined to specify the date the company would resume its Mogadishu flights.
As the investigation entered its second day, foreign technical experts joined the investigation into the cause of the explosion in Daallo Airlines plane which was heading to Djibouti when the mysterious blast went off inside the aircraft.
The blast has killed one person who the government identified as Abdulaahi Abdisalam Borle.
Lack of information and contradicting accounts by Somali and western officials who spoke to the media outlets seem to be the main confusion at this point.
A western diplomat who asked not to be named told Wall Street Journal that investigators believe a passenger who boarded a commercial plane in a wheelchair may have been a suicide bomber responsible for an explosion that tore a hole in the side of the jet as it took off from Somalia’s capital.
However, Somalia’s deputy prime minister Mohamed Omar Arteh asserted that the ongoing investigation produced a ‘suspicious’ result which required a further inquiry to establish the real cause of the blast.
Most of the flights bound for Mogadishu were cancelled on Wednesday following the incident, as Somali government vowed it would beef up security for the Mogadishu international airport to prevent security threats.