German Ammunition Missing After Flight To Mali

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The German military has announced that a crate of containing hundreds of pieces of ammunition went missing during an Air France flight taken by German soldiers to Mali, Defense News reports.

“We are still looking for it,” said the army’s logistics department’s spokesperson when asked to confirm a report on the matter in the Welt am Sonntag newspaper.

The incident occurred on 28 May when German soldiers left Berlin for Bamako, Mali aboard a commercial Air France flight with a stopover in Paris.

The troops’ weapons and ammunition were registered and placed in the hold for storage. However, when the flight reached Mali a plastic crate holding 880 pieces of ammunition was nowhere to be found. The German military reported the incident to the Berlin police, said the spokesperson.

A spokesman for the defence ministry told AFP that “the responsibility lies with the airline.” Air France, however, has yet to comment on the incident.

Germany is participating in a United Nations missions in Mali (MINUSMA) as well as having 200 soldiers temporarily stationed in the country as part of a European mission to train Malian troops.

Due to the worsening situation in the Mali, however, the UN has requested an additional deployment of 2,049 troops and some 480 extra police officers to join the 12,000-strong mission already present in the country.

The UN mission in Mali was established in April 2013 to support the local political process and “carry out a number of security-related stabilisation tasks,” according to the UN. It is widely considered one of the UN’s most dangerous missions.