US officials said today an American anti-drug surveillance plane had given assistance to a Peruvian Air Force jet that shot down a private aircraft carrying US missionaries over the Amazon jungle, killing an American woman and her baby.
However US embassy officials in Lima would not comment on whether the American plane had communicated with the Peruvian jet before the downing of the civilian aircraft, which the White House called a "tragic accident."
The Peruvian Air Force said it opened fire on the Cessna 185 "floatplane" after it failed to heed warnings to land.
"A US government tracking aircraft was in the area in support of the Peruvian intercept mission," a State Department official said on condition of anonymity.
"US radar and aircraft provide tracking information on planes suspected of smuggling illegal drugs in the region to the Peruvian air force," he added, stressing that the US spy planes are unarmed.
The Peruvian Air Force was not available for further comment today.
The Cessna's pilot, Mr Kevin Donaldson, ditched the plane into the Amazon River after it was riddled with bullets -- one of which wounded him in the leg.
Ms Roni Bowers, 35, of the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania-based Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, and her seven-month-old daughter Charity were killed in the incident.
Ms Bowers' husband, Jim, and their son, Cory, escaped unhurt and were flown from the crash site, 120 miles from the Colombian border, to the northern city of Iquitos overnight. The couple, from Muskegon, Michigan, had been working in Peru since 1993.