Egypt on the same page as Russia, but at loggerheads with France, as investigations into air disasters continue
Russia isn’t ready to lift its ban on direct flights to Egypt: Russian investigators left Cairo last week unimpressed, according to reports in Russian media. News website RBTH quotes a Russian-language report in the business newspaper Kommersant as saying “Russian security services oppose [the] restoration of flights to Egypt” because “the safety measures recommended by Russia are so far only ‘85 percent’ implemented.” Russian officials also reportedly “expressed doubts about the quality of the [Egyptian airport] personnel.”
Egypt at loggerheads with France, on the same page as Russia in probes into air disasters: Egyptian and Russian investigators issued a joint statement on Thursday, 8 September saying they identified the point at which Metrojet flight 9268 began disintegrating, Reuters reports. The statement came after the two sides finished piecing together the remains of the Airbus A321, which crashed over Sinai on Halloween Day 2015, killing all 224 people on board. The RBTH report alleges the bomb was planted in the oversized luggage area, meaning “it has been almost certainly established that the terrorists were assisted by one of the airport staff.”
Relations between French and Egyptian investigators probing the crash of EgyptAir flight 804 are reportedly on the rocks, Le Figaro (paywall, French) reports. The center-right daily reports that French investigators discovered traces of the explosive TNT on wreckage from the downed Airbus A320. French investigators have refused to write a joint report with Egypt confirming the TNT find, saying they were unable to carry out a proper inspection to confirm how the TNT got on the wreckage. We’re told the discovery, if confirmed, would reinforce Egypt’s contention that the crash was the result of terrorism — and runs counter to the preferred French thesis that a maintenance issue brought down the jetliner in May 2016. Proof that the crash was the result of a terror attack would call into question security procedures at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport. Reuters has picked up the Figaro report in English.