British lab to look for TNT on Smolensk plane wreckage: report
PR dla Zagranicy
Paweł Kononczuk
23.02.2017 12:25
A British laboratory is to carry out tests to determine if there are traces of TNT on samples from the wreckage of the Polish presidential plane which crashed in 2010, the Gazeta Wyborcza daily has reported.
The site of the Polish presidential plane crash in 2010. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
According to the paper, a commission set up to carry out a new probe into the crash of the presidential plane in Smolensk, western Russia, signed a contract with the Forensic Explosives Laboratory (FEL), based in Fort Halstead, near London, in December last year.
“The laboratory will not comment on the possible cause of the crash. Its role will be limited to providing a scientific opinion” on the possible presence of explosive substances, the paper said.
The laboratory regularly works with British courts and has examined the 1988 Lockerbie plane wreckage, as well as fragments of bombs from terror attacks in London in 2005, Gazeta Wyborcza said.
Poland’s Law and Justice (PiS) party, which came to power in late 2015, has reopened a probe into the presidential plane crash.
Some PiS politicians have claimed the presidential plane was brought down by an explosion, and have challenged a report under Poland’s previous government which concluded the crash was an accident.
The PiS party is headed by Jarosław Kaczyński, twin brother of Polish President Lech Kaczyński, who died in the crash in Smolensk, along with 95 others.
(tf/pk)
Source: Gazeta Wyborcza