Poland to sell three government planes

Poland is selling Tu-154 and Yak-40 government planes following recommendations in a report on the crash that killed President Lech Kaczynski, deputy Defense Minister, Czeslaw Mroczek said on Friday. Mroczek, responsible for implementing recommendations from Poland's report into the Kaczynski plane crash, said that government's Tu-154 and Yak-40 planes, both produced in Russia, had been put up for sale. A Tu-154 plane carrying Kaczynski, his wife and a host of top officials crashed in heavy fog as it attempted to land at an airfield near the western Russian city of Smolensk. The delegation was flying to Smolensk to mark the 70th anniversary of the 1940 Katyn massacre of thousands of Polish officers by Soviet secret police. All 96 people on board the plane died. On Thursday, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said he had fired 13 of the country's top military officials after Warsaw's report into the tragedy, which suggested that both the Polish and Russian sides were at fault. In mid-January, Interstate Aviation Committee (MAK) released the Russian version of the high-profile tragedy, putting the blame for the crash on the Polish crew. Polish politicians denounced the report.