Iraqi army helicopter crash kills 7

An Iraqi military helicopters seen during an operation to carry coalition troops from Nineveh Joint Operations Command headquarters to various parts of Mosul, on October 19, 2016 [Anadolu Agency]

An Iraqi army helicopter crashed during a routine flight on Sunday, killing all seven people on board, a military statement and Iraqi air force officers said.

The Russian-made Mi-17 helicopter went down near the southern province of Kut, the statement said. Two pilots and five army officers were killed, Iraqi air force officers told Reuters.

A technical malfunction caused the crash, the military statement said.

Iraq is slowly rebuilding its air force, once one of the world’s largest, after the US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003.

Unless otherwise stated in the article above, this work by Middle East Monitor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If the image(s) bear our credit, this license also applies to them. What does that mean? For other permissions, please contact us.