egypt pulls second black box of doomed plane out of the...

I N T E R N A T I O N A LSATURDAY, JUNE 18, 2016

NEW YORK: A Turkish businessman shouldn’t beable to use his wealth to avoid having to remainbehind bars while he awaits trial on charges hehelped Iran evade US sanctions, a federal judgeruled on Thursday.

The ruling by US District Judge Richard Bermanrejected a bid by Reza Zarrab to instead be con-fined to a Manhattan apartment with private securi-ty paid for by him.

Prosecutors had told the judge Zarrab shouldremain in jail because his wealth and overseas con-nections make him a flight risk. His lawyers coun-tered by proposing a $50 million bail packageessentially making him a prisoner in his own home.

Under the defense proposal, the Zarrab wouldhave paid for private, around-the-clock security,

including video cameras, an alarm system andarmed guards. His lawyers said he would even signa waiver saying the guards could shoot him if hetried to escape.

The judge, in his decision, called the defense’selaborate home detention proposal “unreasonable”because it raises too many liability issues. He alsosaid it would foster unequal treatment for rich peo-ple. The judge cited an earlier ruling in a separatecase that found such conditions would be “contraryto underlying principles of detention and releaseon bail that individuals otherwise ineligible forrelease should be able to buy their way out by con-structing a private jail, policed by security guardsnot trained or ultimately accountable to the gov-ernment, even if carefully selected.”

Zarrab’s attorney Benjamin Brafman said thedefense team was “deeply disappointed” with theruling and would consider an appeal.

He said lawyers were “intent on continuing tovigorously defend Mr. Zarrab, who we believe to beinnocent.” Zarrab, who was arrested earlier this yearin Miami, has pleaded not guilty to US chargesaccusing him of aiding Iran in its deception of theUnited States and the international banking systemfrom 2010 to 2015, enabling millions of dollars toget through.

Zarrab is well known in Turkey, partly becausehe’s married to Turkish pop star and TV personalityEbru Gundes. In 2013, he was arrested in a Turkishgovernment corruption case, but the charges weredropped. —AP

US judge rejects bail bid by jailed Turkish businessman

CAIRO: The second black box of the doomed EgyptAir planethat crashed last month killing all 66 people on board waspulled out of the Mediterranean Sea yesterday, a day afterEgypt’s investigation committee said the plane’s cockpit voicerecorder had been recovered.

The find significantly raises hopes that investigators willfinally able to determine what caused the crash of the EgyptAirAirbus A320. Both France and the United States are sendinginvestigators to Cairo to help with the probe.

The recovery of the black boxes follows a breakthrough earli-er in the week, when ships searching the part of theMediterranean north of Egypt spotted the wreckage of theplane and started mapping its debris on the seabed. It’s still notknown what brought the plane down between the Greek islandof Crete and the Egyptian coast - or whether the aircraft brokeapart in the air, or stayed intact until it struck the water.

No militant claimNo militant group has said it downed the plane, which was

flying to Cairo from Paris when it crashed on May 19. The wreck-age was believed to be at a depth of about 3,000 meters (9,800feet). Previously, search crews found only small floating piecesof debris and some human remains. Yesterday, a statementfrom the Egyptian committee said the vessel John Lethbridge,contracted by the Egyptian government to search for thewreckage, pulled the data recorder out of the sea in stages. Itadded that it managed to “successfully retrieve” the memoryunit of the recorder, which is the “most important” component.

While the statement didn’t elaborate on the condition of therecorder, it implied that the memory unit had been safely recov-ered. The two so-called black boxes were tucked into theplane’s tail. The committee said later Friday it received bothblack boxes, which were brought to Cairo from the port city ofAlexandria, where they were transferred to from the site of thecrash. The data will be downloaded and analyzed in the comingdays. “The analysis might take weeks,” the committee said,adding that the timespan depends on the condition of thememory units in the recorders. If there is damage, the state-ment said the recorders may have to be taken outside of Egyptto be repaired.

France’s Accident Investigating Bureau, or BEA, said Fridayit’s sending an investigator to Cairo “to lend our technicalexpertise to the reading of the two recordings.” On Thursday,the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board also said it’s send-ing an investigator and a recorder specialist to Cairo. Honeywell,the U.S. technology company that manufactured the cockpitvoice recorder, is providing technical support as well.

A top security official at the Cairo International Airport, Brig.Gen. Fahmi Megahed, ordered extra security measures at thecivil aviation ministry headquarters and the investigation teamoffices, where the recorders will be analyzed. Both are adjacentto the airport.

The flight’s movementsFlight 804 disappeared from radar about 2:45 a.m. local time,

after it had entered Egyptian airspace. Radar data showed the

aircraft had been cruising normally in clear skies before it turned90 degrees left, then a full 360 degrees to the right as it plum-meted from 38,000 feet (11,582 meters) to 15,000 feet (4,572meters). It disappeared when it was at an altitude of about10,000 feet (3,048 meters). Leaked flight data indicated a sensorhad detected smoke in a lavatory and a fault in two of theplane’s cockpit windows in the final moments of the flight.

“The plane clearly suffered an instant severe damage thatleft it uncontrollable,” said Shaker Kelada, an EgyptAir officialwho was not involved in the search but has led other crashinvestigations for the national carrier. He said finding the blackboxes was “a great success” but that “now time and patience isneeded to analyze them.”

Egypt’s civil aviation minister, Sherif Fathi, has said terrorismis a more probable cause than equipment failure or some othercatastrophic event. John Lethbridge, the vessel that found thewreckage, arrived on June 9 at the port of Alexandria, carryinghighly specialized equipment of the Deep Ocean Search com-pany. A statement from DOS said the search team eventuallynarrowed down the search to “a depth equal to 10 times theheight of London Shard tower” a 3,000 meter, 95-storey sky-scraper in London. Investigators said earlier that they had nar-rowed down search area to a five-kilometer (three-mile) radiusof the Mediterranean.

Finding the black boxes was essential and could revealwhether a mechanical fault, a hijacking or a bomb caused thedisaster. Investigators also hope the black boxes will offer cluesas to why there was no distress call. — AP

Egypt pulls second black box

of doomed plane out of the sea

Pulled out of the Mediterranean Sea yesterday

Black box found

SOURCE: Maps4News/HERE AP

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TEHRAN: Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency is report-ing that an explosion in a subway tunnel in the capital,Tehran, has killed two workers and damaged a gaspipeline. The report said that the explosion took place at4:30 a.m. yesterday while digging took place on a subwaytunnel in northwestern Tehran.

The official IRNA news agency also reported that theexplosion damaged phone cables, water and gas pipelinesbut it did not report any casualties. In March, a heating gascapsule exploded injuring at least 12 people in a bazaar inthe capital. Such explosions are occasionally reported inIran, mainly because of poor safety measures. — AP

explosion in Tehran

subway kills 2 workers

WASHINGTON: Dozens of US diplomats think America shouldlaunch military strikes against the Syrian government, according to aState Department document, breaking ranks with President BarackObama’s policy on the bloody civil war. The so-called “dissent chan-nel” cable urges attacks against Bashir al-Assad’s regime for its per-sistent violations of a shaky ceasefire aimed at bringing an end to thefive-year conflict.

It emerged as Russian forces bombed US-backed militia in Syria,highlighting the tangle of alliances in a war where Moscow is work-ing to prop up its chief regional partner.

The cable, signed by working-level diplomats, demands “a judi-cious use of stand-off and air weapons”, according to the New YorkTimes, and lays bare the divisions in Washington policy circles.

With only seven months left in office and a clear aversion to get-ting bogged down in Middle East conflicts, Obama has shown littleappetite for such action. But the administration’s alternative policy-to work with Russia to secure a ceasefire in Syria’s five-year civil warand talks on a political transition-has made little headway.

That policy received a further blow when Assad’s Russian allieslaunched raids in southern Syria, according to the Pentagon. “Today,Russian aircraft conducted a series of airstrikes near al-Tanf againstSyrian Counter-ISIL forces that included individuals who havereceived US support,” said a senior US defence official who request-ed anonymity. ISIL is an alternative name for the Islamic State Group.“Russia’s latest actions raise serious concern about Russian inten-tions. We will seek an explanation from Russia on why it took thisaction and assurances this will not happen again.”

Washington and Moscow have publicly vowed to work togetherto persuade Assad to negotiate a settlement with his opponents, butthe US has frequently expressed exasperation about what it sees asRussia’s less-than-fulsome commitment.

US policy on Syria has been criticized for ineffectiveness, after fiveyears of brutal internecine fighting that has claimed hundreds ofthousands of lives and sent many more fleeing.

American forces are engaged in Syria but are assisting local mili-tias to fight the Islamic State jihadist group, not confronting Assad’sRussian and Iranian-backed forces. The State Department cable saysAssad’s continued violation of a countrywide partial ceasefire-a ces-sation of hostilities-that was negotiated in February, meant a politi-cal settlement was untenable, the Times reported. — AFP

US should bomb

Assad: dissident

diplomat cable