Foreign Ministry of Kazakhstan thanked Thailand government for suggestion to release crew Il-76
Astana. February 9. Kazakhstan Today - The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan is grateful to the government of Thailand for the suggestion to release the crew of Il-76 and continues to hope for release of the pilots. The official representative of the department, Askar Abdrahmanov, informed at a weekly briefing in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan, answering journalists' questions, the agency reports.
"We are grateful to the government of Thailand for the recommendation to release our pilots," A. Abdrahmanov said. Thus, he has underlined that "release of the pilots is completely in the competence of the Office of Public Prosecutor."
"We do not doubt objectivity of Thai Office of Public Prosecutor and justice and we continue to hope for the positive decision for our pilots," the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
"The next hearing of the case of the crew of Il-76 will be held on February 11."The Office of Public Prosecutor of Thailand can make the decision this day to either close the case or prolong the term of imprisonment," he explained.
As informed earlier, the government of Thailand had asked the State Office of Public Prosecutor to close the case against the crew of Il-76 detained in Bangkok and to release the pilots.
"The Cabinet of Ministers directed this suggestion to the State Office of Public Prosecutor," the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Thailand informed."
As informed earlier, the plane Il-76 of the Georgian airline Air West Georgia was detained at the airport Don Myang in Bangkok on December 12, 2009, where it landed to re-fuel on the way from Pyongyang. The arms forbidden to export from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea by the decision of the UN Security Council were revealed onboard of the plane: rocket-propelled grenades, surface-to-air missile launchers, and other weapons. The crew members - the citizen of Belarus and four citizens of Kazakhstan were detained and accused of illegal storage of weapons and its transportation through the Kingdom of Thailand territory.
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