The German army said yesterday it was investigating a helicopter crash in the Afghan capital that killed seven of its soldiers, but said there was no indication hostile fire was to blame.
The single-engine Sikorsky CH-53 came down in a derelict industrial area about 6km from central Kabul on Saturday during a routine patrol.
All seven German crewmen, part of the country's more than 1,200-strong contribution to Kabul's International Security Assistance Force, were killed.
The aircraft crash was the first since ISAF's deployment last year and brought German military fatalities in Afghanistan to 10 out of total losses for the peacekeeping force of 14.
The commander of the German ISAF contingent, Brig Gen Werner Freers, said German air force safety specialists had been sent to Kabul to investigate.
"As of now, we don't have any indication that the helicopter was shot at - no indication at all. But we can only be 100 per cent sure after the end of the work of the commission."
He said a ceremony would be held for the dead as soon as the investigation allowed.
ISAF spokesman Mr Gordon Mackenzie, a witness to the crash, denied reports that two Afghan children had been found dead at the scene.
"I was one of the first people there. There were definitely no Afghan civilians of any description found dead at the scene and we don't expect to find any."
The German Defence Ministry later said the two missing girls had returned home to their parents.
He added that standards of maintenance of German helicopters in Kabul were equivalent to those in Germany.
Mr Mackenzie said the helicopter was obviously in difficulties before it crashed.
"Flames appeared to be coming from the engine directly beneath the rotor," he said.
ISAF officials, who did not want to be identified, said they believed the crash may have been caused by engine trouble rather than foul play.
German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder said on Saturday he was "greatly shaken" by the crash that came 48 hours after a grenade attack at the gates of the German headquarters in Kabul that killed three Afghans including the attacker. - (Reuters)