China plane crash mystery

Two Chinese military planes crashed into in a village last week, killing 15 airmen and a family of six, a local government official said on Wednesday.

The planes crashed on the same day at different times, and mysteriously hit the same spot near an aiport in Kaifeng country, in Henan province.

"They were very old military planes," a local government official told Reuters news agency.

"Perhaps something went wrong with the engines mid-flight."

According to the Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy, the two planes, said to be conducting flight safety tests, crashed within 10 minutes of each other.

The cause of the accidents was not known and it was unclear why both crashes occurred so close to each other.

Media blackout

The human rights centre said one plane slammed into the home of Liu Wenjun, injuring him and killing his parents, wife, brother and two other relatives who were eating lunch at the time.

These kinds of big military accidents have always been off limits to the press

Hong Kong human rights group

A relative of Mr Liu said he was still in a military hospital in Kaifeng undergoing treatment for burns.

The centre said that the local journalists who rushed to the scene after the accident were told not to report it.

"These kinds of big military accidents have always been off limits to the press," the human rights group said.

"They are not only a question of ordinary citizens being killed, but also bring into question the right of the taxpayer to know how their money is being spent on national defence," it said.

A local newspaper reporter confirmed the story had been suppressed.

"Our journalists went to the site, but the propaganda department sent an official who told us not to report it or we would be seriously punished," he told Reuters.