Reports from Vietnam say that the wreckage of a military aircraft which crashed in Laos on Monday has been found with all twenty-six people on board dead.

The Vietnamese newspaper, Youth, said that the aeroplane crashed about forty kilometres north-east of the Laotian capital, Vientiane near the Plain of Jars, in bad weather.

Reports from Hanoi and Vientane said that the Vietnamese deputy defence minister, Dao Trong Lich and a Laotian army deputy chief of general staff were on board the aircraft, which was also carrying thirteen Vietnamese and eleven Laotian officers.