4 French Confirmed Dead in Antarctic Copter Crash

Published October 30, 2010

| Associated Press

ADELAIDE, Australia -- All four people on a French helicopter that crashed this week in rough weather in Antarctica were confirmed dead Saturday, Australian and French rescuers said.

Another helicopter from Dumont-d'Urville scientific station in Antarctica flew to the site of the crashed aircraft and a doctor on board confirmed the deaths, the Australian Maritime Safety Authority said in a statement.

The helicopter crashed Thursday night and its distress beacon was activated about 62 miles from Dumont-d'Urville. Heavy clouds obscuring visibility prevented searches by helicopter, so a U.S. Air Force C17 and an Australian air force plane flew over the site.

The Australian plane spotted what appeared to be three bodies on Friday evening and dropped survival equipment in case there were any survivors.

Those aircraft carried four French citizens -- a pilot, a mechanic and two employees of the French Polar Institute, a state-run research center often known by its French acronym IPEV.

The institute said the bodies of the men were recovered and brought back to Dumont-d'Urville with the assistance of a Hercules C130 sent by Australia.

"A chapel of rest has been set up at the base to receive the remains," the statement said.

The downed AS350 Squirrel helicopter was operated in Antarctica from the French research vessel, L'Astrolabe, which is currently icebound about 230 miles northeast of the Dumont-d'Urville station.

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French Airline Flies Into Baghdad From Paris

BAGHDAD -- A French airline flew into Baghdad's international airport Sunday morning, becoming one of the first passenger carriers to fly into the capital direct from western Europe since before the Gulf War.

The inaugural flight by France's Aigle Azur, which touched down shortly after 6 a.m. local time, consisted of French officials and was largely ceremonial. The airline won't begin regularly scheduled flights for another two to three months but if successful, the flights would mark an important milestone in Iraq's economic development.

Some carriers, such as Austrian Airlines, fly from western Europe to the Kurdish city of Irbil. Regional airlines such as the Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways, Bahrain's Gulf Air, the Beirut-based MEA airline and Turkish Airlines fly to the Iraqi capital.

But there are no direct passenger flights between Baghdad and western Europe. The Stockholm-based Nordic Airways launched commercial flights to Baghdad from Copenhagen, Denmark in January 2009 but its operating license was revoked later that month.

The lack of major European carriers flying to Baghdad shows the difficulties the country is having attracting major foreign investments in anything but the surest economic bets. Although some western companies bid on the country's first round of oil licensing last year, it was only for the biggest and safest fields.

Attempts by Iraq's national carrier, Iraqi Airways, to launch flights to London last April were swiftly squashed when lawyers for neighboring Kuwait tried to confiscate the inaugural plane after it touched down in London to settle debts from the 1990 invasion by Iraq of Kuwait.

The Aigle Azur flight landed Sunday morning at Baghdad International Airport after taking off late Saturday from Paris. A delegation of French business leaders planning to attend the Baghdad International Fair, an annual showcase designed to attract businesses to Iraq, was on board.

Airline officials said regular commercial flights won't start for another two to three months, and tickets will go on sale soon. The French airline plans to fly into Baghdad twice a week from Charles de Gaulle.

Aigle Azur is a French carrier that flies from Paris's Orly and Charles de Gaulle airports to locations mainly in Africa, such as Algeria, Mali, Morocco and Tunisia. They also operate flights to the French cities of Lille, Lyon, Marseille, Mulhouse and Toulouse.

The German carrier, Deutsche Lufthansa AG, was slated to begin regular flights between Munich and Baghdad Sept. 30 but canceled them due to a lack of customer interest.

The news was a blow to Iraq's hopes to reconnect Baghdad with international capitals since most western airlines discontinued flights to the city following the 1991 Gulf War.

For years, many of the regional and western carriers shied away from Iraq due to safety concerns. The few airlines who did fly into and out of the airport formerly named after Saddam Hussein performed a tight corkscrew when landing, a spiraling maneuver designed to protect them from missile attack.

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French strike to save 'birthright' of privileges

MARSEILLE, France –  Battling for benefits is a tradition in the Gilly family, passed from generation to generation — as it is for families across the country. And that goes some way toward explaining why the protests against plans to raise France's retirement age have shown such determination and ferocity.

For Gilly and many other Frenchmen and women, social benefits such as long vacations, state-subsidized health care and early retirement are more than just luxuries: They're seen as a birthright — an essential part of the identity of today's France.

The protest against a government plan to raise the retirement age to 62 has special meaning for five members of the Eric Gilly clan who are demonstrating in the streets of Marseille.

"We want to stop working at 60 because it's something our parents, our grandparents and even our great-grandparents fought for," says Gilly, 50, a union representative at Saint-Pierre Cemetery, the largest in this bustling Mediterranean port city.

"And over the years ... you can see that we're losing everything they fought for. And that's unacceptable."

In Marseille, strikes to protest President Nicolas Sarkozy's planned retirement reform have shut down docks, left tons of garbage putrefying on sidewalks and drawn tens of thousands into the streets for each of six protest marches since early September.

Gilly, with huge drums strapped over his shoulders, led the parade for the Workers' Force union Monday. His sister, two daughters and a nephew weren't far behind.

"Unionism, it's in the skin," Gilly said in an interview with Associated Press Television News. "It's more than a passion. When something is wrong or things aren't right, they have to be changed."

The nation usually watches with care over its citizens, who for decades have used street power to help shape French policy, sometimes pulling the rug from under politicians' feet.

Retirement benefits are coveted, by some, perhaps even more than a higher salary, making the issue particularly sensitive. Sarkozy's plan to raise the retirement age hits a nerve deep in the French psyche.

"France is showing some of its old cultural reflexes," said Etienne Schweisguth of the Center for European Studies at the Foundation for Political Science. "When there is something we aren't pleased with we must protest."

Trying to undo what the state wants dates back to an anarchist tradition of the 19th century, when unions first led a struggle against capitalism and a refusal to align with political parties, said Schweisguth. One wing of the hard-core CGT union, which is leading many of today's protests, still looks to that tradition.

Despite the anti-government protests, it is the French state that has for centuries been charged with protecting individuals and their rights.

"The state is the guarantor of the moral good," said Schweisguth, who studies changes in attitudes and values in society.

It was in 1982, under Socialist President Francois Mitterrand, that the minimum age to stop working was lowered from 65 to 60. The measure, emblematic of the 14-year Mitterrand presidency, was adopted by a special ordinance that bypassed parliament.

Sixty has since become a golden number — and the battle cry for entire families fearful of losing benefits bestowed on grandparents, parents or colleagues at work. Including the Gillys.

"This is a family affair because unionism is our big family," said Stephanie, 22, who is among Marseille's striking garbage collectors. "Our elders fought for retirement at 60."

"We have all the generations represented," she said. "There's me, my little sister, Dad. There we go. And then there will be our children, too. We will teach them."

Schweisguth said, that despite the ruckus, strikers represent a minority of the population and that, while polls show backing for such actions, they do not measure the fervor of the backing, which he called "flaccid."

Sarkozy, a conservative, has made pushing the legal retirement age back up a priority.

"The French are moaners, sometimes grouches. But at the same time they're lucid, intelligent and responsible," the daily Le Figaro quoted him as saying in May, when he criticized Mitterrand's 1982 decision. "They will be able to acknowledge that there is no alternative to our reforms."

But Sarkozy is increasingly unpopular, and he may be off the mark.

Gilly, a burly man dressed in red from his baseball cap to his Workers' force union bib, pounds the huge drum hanging from his neck at a street protest against the retirement reform, keeping time to the chorus of voices singing "The International," the Communist anthem.

"You're not really going to push up the age of people who retire with this reform," says his nephew, Mathias Gilly, a retailer. "In reality, it's going to mean a smaller pension for people when they do retire."

Gilly packs up his drum for another day, vowing that he and his family will keep up protests — "for as long as it takes."

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