Foreign Ministry Denies Lebanese On Board Malaysian Jetliner

The Foreign Ministry denied on Saturday reports saying that two Lebanese nationals, holding the Australian citizenship, were among the 298 people on board the Malaysian jetliner that crashed in violence-wracked Ukraine.

“After the Foreign Ministry obtained the detailed name list of the passengers on the flight and after contacting our the Lebanese Embassy and Consulate in Australia, we found out that the two individuals are not Lebanese,” the ministry said in a statement.

“The two individuals from Rizk family hold the Egyptian and Australian nationalities,” the statement added.

The ministry said that it's still verifying that no Lebanese citizen is among the victims.

Media reports said on Friday that Albert and Mary Rizk are two Lebanese nationals on board the Malaysia Airlines passenger jet.

They live in Melbourne, Australia.

The Boeing 777 passenger jet carrying 298 people came down in flames late Thursday in cornfields in separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine, with US officials saying it was shot down by a surface-to-air missile.

Passengers on the plane included a large contingent of world-renowned AIDS researchers and activists headed to an international AIDS conference in Melbourne, Australia.

News of their deaths sparked an outpouring of grief across the global scientific community.

H.K.