Briton died in Libya jet crash, says official

TUNIS (Agencies) - A Briton was among the victims when the Libyan Boeing 727 crashed on Tuesday, killing all 158 on board, a British official in Tripoli said. The official, at the British-interests section in the Italian embassy, said he could not release the name of the victim.

There were also reports yesterday that three British women, named as Barbara Gunner and her two daughters Sarah and Nicola, died on Monday, when a Dutch DC-10 crashed at Faro airport, in Portugal.

Libya decreed three days of national mourning for the victims yesterday and said its planes urgently needed spare parts, banned by UN sanctions. The official Jana news agency, reported that 'a source at the Civil Aviation Board said the aviation sector in the Great Jamahiriya (Libya) faces acute difficulties in obtaining aviation spare parts and the materials necessary for aviation activity'. But the agency did not draw a link between the spare-parts problem and the Boeing 727 which crashed near Tripoli on a domestic flight to the capital from the eastern city of Benghazi.