KABUL, Feb 5 (AFP) - The wreckage of a missing Afghan jet was found Saturday in mountains east of the capital Kabul with all 104 people on board feared dead, an interior ministry spokesman said.
"So far we don't think there are any survivors," interior ministry spokesman Lutfullah Mashal said.
"The plane is completely destroyed."
The wreckage was found in mountains 20 kilometres (12 miles) east of Kabul at around 0930 GMT during a joint search operation by Afghan police, army and peacekeeping troops from the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), he said.
The area has been blanketed by heavy snow this week and Afghan officials said bad weather was preventing search teams from reaching the wreckage on the ground to check for any possible survivors.
The Boeing 737 of the private airline Kam Air went missing on Thursday during a domestic flight from the western city of Herat to Kabul.
ISAF helicopters found the wreckage and the NATO-lead peacekeeping force then deployed a specialized mountain rescue team to the site.
"We have found it ... at an altitude of 3,000 meters (9,840 feet)," ISAF spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Patrick Poulain said.
There were 23 confirmed foreign nationals aboard the aircraft, including six Americans, one Iranian, three Italians, nine Turks and four Russian crew members, official sources from the countries or companies said.
"Apache helicopters from ISAF spotted the wreckage and a team of mountain rescue specialists is on site," Poulain added.
He would not comment on the fate of the passengers, saying it was too early to know.
A Canadian ISAF soldier questioned near the crash site said a camp had been established at the base of the mountain, where the wreckage was visible.
The mountain was so steep the operation could "take days", said the soldier who wished to remain anonymous.
Defense ministry spokesman General Zahir Azimi, who flew over the crash site, said bad weather was preventing the search for crash victims and the operation would resume on Sunday.
"After the crash site was spotted, I flew in a helicopter with some ISAF helicopters down to the site, but since the cloud was too low on the crash site we could not land and even we could not see the spot, we returned and will resume the search operation tomorrow," he told AFP.
"I can only say that we have spotted the crash site but I cannot talk about the fate of passengers."
Kam Air owner Zmarai Kamgar confirmed the wreckage of the plane had been found but was also unable to elaborate on the fate of the passengers.
"The (wreckage of) the Kam Air plane which crashed on Thursday has been found. I am on my way to the site but cannot talk about the fate of the passengers, it is premature to say anything about them," he said earlier.
Kabul is surrounded by mountains and Afghanistan's rugged landscape, 40 percent of which is 1,800 meters (5,900 feet) or more above sea level, presents a challenge to pilots.
Earlier Saturday ISAF forces joined by hundreds of Afghan soldiers had resumed combing the mountains east of Kabul amid bad weather.
ISAF had mobilised two platoons of troops to hunt for the plane in the region southeast of the capital.
Defence ministry spokesman Azimi earlier told AFP some 500 Afghan National Army soldiers were engaged in the search operation.
NATO-led peacekeepers troops and Afghan forces launched a hunt for the aircraft on Friday once it became clear the plane had not landed at any other nearby airports after it disappeared from radar screens.
Three American women working for the US-based Management Science for Health company were probably on the plane, according to one of the firm's officials.
The Turks were civilians working in Afghanistan for firms based in their own country, officials in Ankara said.
The Russians were the plane's captain, a steward and two air hostesses, foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said in Moscow.
Kam Air is the first privately run Afghan airline and was launched in November 2003 with a fleet comprising a Boeing 767, a Boeing 727, an Antonov 24 and the Boeing 737 missing since Thursday.
The airline connects several towns in Afghanistan and also has international flights to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
02/05/2005 16:41 GMT - AFP