An official of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, Oleg Nikolenko, has said that there were Ukrainian citizens on board the Antonov plane that crashed in Greece late Saturday.

"In northern Greece, a Ukrainian AN-12 transport plane carrying a dangerous cargo on the Serbia-Jordan-Bangladesh route crashed.

The crew consisted of eight Ukrainian citizens.

The previous cause of the accident is the breakdown of one of the engines", he wrote on Facebook, Telegraph reports.

As Nikolenko further informed, an operational headquarters was opened in Thessaloniki by order of the head of Ukrainian diplomacy, Dmytro Kuleba.

"Ukrainian consuls have already arrived at the site of the disaster and are interacting with rescue teams and Greek law enforcement to investigate the circumstances of the incident.

Currently, work is being done to extinguish the fire."

Separately, a cargo plane crashed near the city of Kavala in northern Greece late Saturday, the fire brigade and state television said.

#BREAKING: UR-CIC, an Antonov An-12TB cargo aircraft of Meridian Ltd from #Ukraine with flight No.

#MEM3032 crashed near #Kavala in #Greece on its way from Nis to Amman!

Locals filmed the moment of the crash.

It was burning when it hit the ground!

Engine fire had spread to the wing👇 pic.twitter.com/LQNOEbz1Yd

— Babak Taghvaee – The Crisis Watch (@BabakTaghvaee1) July 16, 2022

According to Reuters, state television Ert reported that the plane was an Antonov An-12 owned by a Ukrainian company, which was flying from Serbia to Jordan.

The pilot had requested an emergency landing due to an engine problem, but his signal was lost.

The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense of Serbia, Nebojsa Stefanovic, held an extraordinary press conference on Sunday regarding the downing of the Ukrainian plane that was flying from Serbia to Jordan and crashed in Greece.

Stefanovic has confirmed that the plane left Nis airport on Saturday at 20:40 and that it was carrying ammunition of the Serbian company Valir for the Ministry of Defense of Bangladesh.

In this regard, he announced that the plane was transporting about 11.5 tons of products of the Serbian industry dedicated to the final customer in Bangladesh.

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