Libya’s army ​chief of staff, Mohammed ‍Ali Ahmed al-Haddad, and four other Libyan officials have been killed in an air crash near the Turkish capital, ‍Ankara, Libya’s prime minister has said.

Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah said in a statement that the crash on Tuesday was a “tragic accident” that occurred while the officials while returning from a trip from Ankara.

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“This great tragedy is a great loss for the nation, the military establishment, and all the people, as we have lost men who served their country with sincerity and dedication and were an example of discipline, responsibility, and national commitment,” he said in a statement.

Turkiye its gendarmerie had found the wreckage of the plane carrying the Libyan chief of staff, which disappeared shortly after taking off from the Turkish capital.

“The wreckage of the business jet that departed Ankara’s Esenboga airport for Tripoli has been located by Turkish gendarmerie approximately two kilometres [1.2 miles] south of Kesikkavak village in the Haymana district” 74km (45 miles) from Ankara, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said on X.

Yerlikaya said earlier on X that the Falcon 50 business jet had taken ​off at ‌8:10pm (17:10 GMT) on Tuesday and radio contact was lost at 8:52pm (17:52 GMT).

He said the flight ‌had made a request ⁠for an emergency landing while over the Haymana district ‌but no contact was established ‍afterwards.

Several Turkish media outlets broadcast images showing the sky lit up by an explosion not far from the location where the aircraft sent a signal.

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Turkish Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc said the Ankara chief prosecutor’s office has launched an investigation into the incident.

Turkiye’s ‌Ministry of Defence had announced the Libyan chief of staff’s visit ‌to Ankara this ‌week, saying ⁠he had met his Turkish counterpart and other military commanders.

Ankara has close ties with the United Nations-backed government in Tripoli, which it provides with economic and military support.

Al Jazeera’s Malik Traina, reporting from Tripoli, said he knew al-Haddad personally and that his death would be a “huge loss” to the Libyan military.

“He was a career military man, someone that everybody respected, and he went by the book,” Traina said.

“He was someone that people here in Western Libya really respected, someone who always adhered to the law and followed the rules and he didn’t take side with any militias no matter how powerful they were.

“It is a really huge loss to the Libyan military institution.”

Traina said that while al-Haddad was in the military for decades, he played a prominent role on the side of the rebels during the uprising against former leader Muammar Gaddafi.

More to come …