Brazil's Top Aviation Official Denies New Accident Question of Time

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil_Brazil's top aviation official on Thursday rejected a claim that another air disaster is inevitable in the country.

Defense Minister Nelson Jobim told the government news agency Radiobras that critics were "playing politics" by making the claim.

On Wednesday, Marc Baumgartner, president of the International Federation of Air Traffic Controllers, told BBC Brasil that "it's a question of time before a new air accident happens again in Brazil." He made the comments during a seminar in the United States.

Baumgartner also criticized the Brazilian Air Force, which oversees the nation's air traffic control system, for trying to punish the controllers involved in the Sept. 29, 2006, crash of a jetliner over the Amazon in which 154 people died.

"The Brazilian Air Force invested lots of energy to arrest and prosecute its own workers but none to fix its (air traffic control) system," Baumgartner was quoted as saying by the O Globo news agency.

The Sept. 29 crash was Brazil's worst air disaster until July, when an Airbus crashed into a warehouse in Sao Paulo killing 199 people.

Earlier this week, a military court declined to indict five Brazilian air traffic controllers for last year's crash.

Two American pilots who were aboard an executive jet that collided with the jetliner still face charges in a civilian criminal court in connection with the accident.

A Congressional commission report into air problems was issued Thursday and it supported the indictment of American pilots Joseph Lepore and Jan Paladino.