Plane crash: Aircraft carried French secret service, supported EU in Mediterranean naval mission

While the EU was quick to deny that a plane that crashed in Safi today formed part of an EU mission, past reports confirm that Luxembourg-based CAE Aviation operates a maritime patrol aircraft which is contributing to EUNAVFOR MED while Le Monde reports secret service DGSE specialists were on board

File photo shows Maltese soldiers on an EU naval mission: the EU is currently running an EUNAVFOR Mediterranean mission off the coasts of Libya
File photo shows Maltese soldiers on an EU naval mission: the EU is currently running an EUNAVFOR Mediterranean mission off the coasts of Libya

A Fairchild Merlin Mark III aircraft registered in the United States and leased to a Luxembourg company crashed this morning after leaving the Malta International Airport runway, leaving five French nationals dead – two pilots and three specialists.

French newspaper le Monde has reported that the the three task specialists on board the aircraft that crashed this morning formed part of the French secret service DGSE - the Directorate General for External Security - equivalent to the CIA or MI6. The French paper said that the other two persons were the employees of CAE, as the private contractor. It also reported that the DGSE intervened in Libya "in particular intelligence missions".

Le Monde also reported that the French defence ministry "refused to specify the destination of the aircraft or the object of his reconnaissance mission".

The Luxembourg-based CAE Aviation has declared that all five victims were civilians, whilst the European Union – through its High Representative Federica Mogherini – has denied that the aircraft was on an EU mission after initial reports identified the victims as French military officers.

The Maltese government said that the the Merlin, a variant of the Fairchild Swearingen Metroliner twin-turboprop aircraft, was part of a French Customs surveillance operation which has been taking place for the past five months, with the aim of tracing routes of illicit trafficking of all sorts, including human and drug trafficking amongst others.

But French Customs issued a tweet, saying that no Customs officials were involved in the accident. 

A quick search on Google has revealed that CAE Aviation – which specializes in aerial surveillance and reconnaissance – operates the maritime patrol aircraft contributing to the EUNAVFOR MED, a military operation launched by the EU in the Mediterranean soon after the 2015 migrant shipwrecks in Libya.

According to the European External Action Service (EEAS), CAE Aviation operates a public-private partnership as part of the EUNAVFOR MED Operation Sophia.

Last year, Luxembourg minister of defence Étienne Schneider visited the airbase of Sigonella in Italy, from where CAE Aviation operates its patrol aircraft. According to EEAS, Luxembourg is one of the 22 EU contributing Member States to EUNAVFOR MED.

CAE Aviation has declared that the civilians were operating the reconnaissance flight on behalf of the French Ministry of Defence, effectively denying that the plane was carrying French military officials on their way to Misurata, in Libya.

The plane did not carry any country colours, an important fact that attracted the attention of Malta plane spotters who have, since earlier this year, spotted the plane multiple times at the Gudja airport.

Libya has now been a hotbed for secret United States and other European missions ever since the fall of dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. In December 2015, a secret US commando mission to Libya was revealed after photographs of a special forces unit were posted on the Facebook page of the country’s air force. The 20 US soldiers had arrived at Libya’s Wattiya airbase, before leaving soon after local commanders asked them to go because they had no permission to be at the base.

Additional reporting by Matthew Agius