Key Points
A charter plane grounded in France for a human trafficking investigation departed on Monday for India, after an exceptional holiday ordeal that left about 300 Indians en route to Central America blocked inside a rural French airport for four days...
Associated Press reporters outside the Vatry Airport in Champagne country saw the unmarked Legend Airlines A340 take off after the crew and about 200 other people boarded the plane..
It did not specify whether human trafficking - which the U.N. defines as "the recruitment, transportation, transfer, harboring or receipt of people through force, fraud or deception, with the aim of exploiting them for profit" - is still suspected, as prosecutors initially said.. French authorities are still investigating the aim of the original flight..
The Legend Airlines A340 plane stopped Thursday for refueling in Vatry en route from Fujairah airport in the United Arab Emirates for Managua, Nicaragua, and was grounded by police based on an anonymous tip that it could be carrying human trafficking victims...
Legend Airlines lawyer Liliana Bakayoko said that it received approval from French authorities to transport 301 of the 303 passengers on a direct flight Monday to Mumbai, but that the final figure is expected to be lower...
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