Nationair Linked to gun-runner

One night in Montreal in October 1991, while staying at a hotel for negotiations with the company, I got a phone call from someone I didn't know, who asked me if I knew what was really in the hold of the airplane that crashed in Saudi Arabia. Now no-one outside of management knew where I was, so a mole must have passed him on to me.....
I had no idea what he was talking about until he mentioned arms shipping. I had discounted it at first, but it really makes you wonder.

Over two years later, Frank magazine published the following. Now, Frank magazine is not known for it's high quality of journalism...but the phrase, "where theres smoke theres fire" did come to mind.

From Frank Magazine April 1, 1993

Frank magazine has learned that Nationair received financing from a major player in the world of international gun-running.

Nationair rented airplanes and borrowed large sums of money from Farhad Azima, a Kansas City businessman whose jets have transported arms to various trouble spots around the globe.

The Nationair DC-8 which crashed in Saudi Arabia in 1991, taking 263 lives, was initially leased from Azima, airport registration records show. Robert Obadia, Nationair's endomorphic president, bought the aircraft from Azima and collected an $8 million insurance payout when it bellyflopped in the desert.

Obadia met Azima in 1984, when Nationair was first launched. Azima's leasing company supplied the airline with two 20-year-old DC-8s.

Azima ran a charter airline called Global International Airways before it filed for bankruptcy in October, 1983. Azima made headlines in 1979 when a Global plane, said to be hauling relief supplies to Costa Rica, landed in Tunisia and was loaded up with weapons.

The plane's nervous crew refused to take-off and the arms were removed before the flight resumed.

The Kansas City Star reported in June, 1984 that Global jets frequently ferried weapons and military equipment disguised as medical or food supplies. In July, 1986, a Boeing-707 owned by Azima and leased to his brother, Farsin Azima, reportedly transported 23-tonnes of military equipment to Iran, resulting in the release of an American hostage held in Lebanon.

The New York Times revealed the Azima brothers' role in the arms-for-hostages deal in a November 1986 report which also appeared in Canadian newspapers.

Obadia claims that he knows nothing about it. He also claims he did not borrow money from Azima in 1985, when his initial shareholders withdrew shortly after Nationair started flying.

Those founding shareholders were Bombardier Chairman Laurent Beaudoin and his wife, Claire Bombardier and Montreal developer Maurice Pinsonnault. The Bombardiers held a 33 percent stake.

Pinsonnault forced Obadia to buy him out in early 1985 and Bob had to cough up close to $1 million to keep the airline alive.