Four Italian military personnel, including two soldiers and two cooperators from the Voluntary Military Corps of the Red Cross, have died this Thursday and another eleven have been injured after crashing to the ground, for causes that are being investigated, a helicopter from the EUFOR Althea operation, the European Union military mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in the north of the Balkan country.
The crashed aircraft is a Chinook CH-47 transport helicopter, which crashed around 16:00 hours in the town of Gorica, near Brcko, according to the Bosnian news portal Raport. A total of 15 people were traveling on the aircraft. The eleven injured are being medically attended to and, for now, none of them are in critical condition, according to the Italian Ministry of Defense.
EUFOR constitutes the European Union military deployment in Bosnia and Herzegovina, responsible for ensuring the implementation of the Dayton agreement that ended the Bosnian war. The contingent of the Althea operation is made up of approximately 1,100 military personnel from some 24 countries.
The Italian Ministry of Defense has finally confirmed the number of victims through a statement released on social media, after the prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, expressed her condolences shortly after the accident to the relatives of the deceased, describing what happened as "a tragic accident".
"My thoughts go to the victims, to their families and to all those who, committed to the mission for peace and stability in the region, are living through hours of anguish. To them goes my most sincere closeness and that of the Italian Government", she noted.
The President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, and the High Representative of European diplomacy, Kaja Kallas, have also conveyed their condolences. "Europe stands in full solidarity with Italy in this very difficult moment. We remain in close contact with the EUFOR Command and our EU representatives on the ground", she stated.