Cargo plane crashes in Afghanistan, casualties

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan, Apr 24 (Reuters) A cargo plane crashed into a residential area of a southern Afghan town today, causing casualties, provincial officials said.

The plane crashed while trying to land at an airfield used by US-led troops in Lashkar Gah, the provincial capital of Helmand, Mahaiuddin, administrative chief for the province, told Reuters by telephone from the scene of the crash.

He said the cause of the crash was unclear.

The number of casualties was uncertain, but at least five wounded civilians were pulled from the rubble of their mud-walled homes, Enayatullah Ghafari, a hospital doctor said.

Foreign troops cordoned off the crash site as ambulances took the injured out, Ghafari said.

British Defence Secretary John Reid was due today to visit British troops stationed in Helmand, but was making a stopover in Kandahar when the cargo plane crashed in Lashkar Gah.

His travel plans were thrown into some doubt as one of the planes being used for his visit had been seconded to help with the emergency in Lashkar Gah, officials said.

Helmand has borne the brunt of a growing insurgency by Taliban fighters, and it is also Afghanistan's main drug producing region.

An official who declined to be named said the cargo plane appeared to have been used by counter-narcotic forces employed by the US government. A US embassy official said he was investigating.

REUTERS PR PM1536