Skip to main content

Merkel set for late G20 arrival after ‘serious’ plane malfunction

BERLIN: Germany’s air force on Friday was investigating a serious technical mishap on Chancellor Angela Merkel’s plane that forced an emergency landing and delayed her arrival at the G20 summit by more than 12 hours.

The latest embarrassing glitch for the German military forced Merkel to instead take a commercial flight to Buenos Aires with a vastly reduced delegation and miss scheduled talks with several world leaders.

It was not yet clear whether Merkel could hold her planned talks at a later stage with US President Donald Trump, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping of China.

Shortly after takeoff from Berlin on Thursday, Merkel’s Airbus A340-300 was forced to turn back over Dutch airspace, and make an emergency landing in Cologne.

The plane had suffered a complete breakdown of the on-board communication system, a problem described as extremely rare, which forced the pilot to communicate via a satellite phone instead.

“It was a serious malfunction,” Merkel told reporters travelling with her aboard the “Konrad Adenauer”, a former Lufthansa airlines jet named after post-war Germany’s first chancellor.

The German air force on Friday ruled out sabotage, with a spokesman telling national news agency DPA that “there is absolutely no indication of a criminal act”.

Merkel had to spend the night in a hotel in nearby Bonn, the former West German capital, because no replacement plane with crew was immediately available.

Early Friday, after just three hour’s sleep, she was taken by a German air force plane to Madrid.

From here, instead of flying her usual Airbus jet with bedroom suite, secure communications and an anti-missile system, she and her trimmed down entourage boarded an Iberia plane for the flight across the Atlantic.

Her husband Joachim Sauer opted to skip the event.

Merkel’s delayed arrival has thrown her schedule into disarray, and DPA reported she was to miss the traditional G20 “family photo” of attending heads of state and government.

The post Merkel set for late G20 arrival after ‘serious’ plane malfunction appeared first on ARYNEWS.



from ARYNEWS https://ift.tt/2AxtA8m
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Trump says he urged team to ‘slow’ COVID-19 testing

US President Donald Trump said Saturday he was encouraging health officials in his administration to slow down coronavirus testing, arguing that increased tests lead to more cases being discovered. The president has claimed falsely on several occasions that surges of COVID-19 in several states can be explained by greater numbers of diagnostic tests. At his first rally since the outbreak forced nationwide shutdowns in March, Trump told the crowd in Tulsa, Oklahoma that testing was a “double-edged sword.” The United States — which has more deaths and cases than any other country — has carried out more than 25 million coronavirus tests, placing it outside the top 20 countries in the world, per capita. “Here is the bad part: When you do testing to that extent, you are going to find more people, you will find more cases,” Trump argued. “So I said to my people ‘slow the testing down.’ They test and they test.” It was not clear from Trump’s tone if he was playing to the crowd, who ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Rouhani calls Imran, discusses resumption of trade

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and Iran on Wednesday discussed full resumption of bilateral trade, which was halted last month because of the Covid-19 pandemic. “The two sides stressed the need to reactivate borders and border markets and strengthen trade ties by following health guidelines,” a statement issued by the Iranian presidency on the telephonic conversation between Prime Minister Imran Khan and President Dr Hassan Rouhani said. President Rouhani had called the prime minister for Ramazan greetings. Border trade between the two countries was suspended after a meeting of the National Security Committee (NSC), held on March 13, decided to close all borders because of the pandemic. Islamabad partially relaxed the restrictions on April 21, allowing the import of certain food items and provision of petrol and diesel to the border areas. Cargo traffic from Iran was allowed for three days every week. Cargo movement between the two countries takes place through five border crossings — Taftan...
Post a Comment
Read more

Today’s outlook: Sindh CM discusses reopening markets with PM Khan

Here are some of the stories we are expecting to follow today (Thursday): Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah will take Prime Minister Imran Khan into confidence over reopening shops and markets across the province. The reopened markets will have to follow SOPs. Sindh Transport Minister Awais Qadir Shah will discuss SOPs with transporters for resuming public transport in the coming days. The meeting will be held at the Sindh Assembly building at 1:30pm. The Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority has proposed a price cut of Rs20.68 per litre for petrol in its summary. Imam-e-Kaaba Sheikh Abdul Rahman Al-Sudais has said Masjid Al Haram and Masjid Al Nabawi will be reopened for worshipers soon. He said the Kaaba is being sterilised using latest technologies. Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar will head various meetings during his visit to Bahawalpur. As of Thursday, Pakistan has reported more than 15,500 confirmed coronavirus cases. ICYMI: An amendment to the National Accountability Or...
Post a Comment
Read more