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Swiss court finds 4 Skyguide staff guilty in 2002 plane crash-1

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A Swiss court convicted Tuesday four air traffic controllers of criminal negligence that led to the deaths of 71 in an air crash five years ago.
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GENEVA, September 4 (RIA Novosti) - A Swiss court convicted Tuesday four air traffic controllers of criminal negligence that led to the deaths of 71 in an air crash five years ago.

The tragedy occurred in July 2002, when a Russian airliner collided with a cargo plane over Lake Constance, in Germany, near the Swiss border. All 69 people on board the plane flying from Bashkortostan in the Urals, including 45 children, were killed in the crash, along with the two pilots in the cargo plane.

The Swiss court gave three Skyguide employees 12-month suspended sentences and fined one. The remaining four staffers were acquitted. All defendants had protested their innocence during the trial.

In late August, the Federal Supreme Court of Switzerland postponed a Zurich court's ruling on the early release of a Russian convicted of murdering Skyguide air traffic controller Peter Nielsen, who was on duty at the time of the crash.

A Zurich court had earlier ordered the early release of Vitaly Kaloyev, who lost his wife and two children in the disaster, but the cantonal prosecutor appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court.

Kaloyev, a 50-year-old architect, was imprisoned in October 2005 after being found guilty of killing Nielsen in February 2004.

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