Hijackers linked to Al Faran?

NEW DELHI, Dec 29 (PTI) — The hijackers of the Indian Airlines airbus to Kandahar, who are being identified as hardcore members of the Pakistani mercenary group, Harkat-ul Ansar (HUA), have demanded release of exactly the same number of 36 militants as Al-Faran had done after abducting five foreign tourists.

Al Faran, which was believed by Western and Indian security agencies to be a front for HUA, now operating as Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, after kidnapping the five foreign tourists from Pahalgam in South Kashmir in 1995 had initially demanded release of 36 Kashmiri militants in exchange for the hostages.

The demand had included the release of 15 hardcore HUA mercenaries, including Maulvi Mohd Masood Azhar, late Sajjad Afghani and Nasrullah Langaryal. Others whose release and safe passage to Pakistan was demanded included prominent jailed Kashmiri militants, including Al Umar chief, Mushtaq Ahmad Jargar, alias Latrum.

However, in protracted negotiations, Al Faran first reduced the number of militants sought to be released to 26 from 36 and as negotiations lasting months continued they progressively cut down their demand to releasing 15, then eight and finally in December 1995 when last contact was made to just release Maulavi Azhar.

According to a recent BBC in-depth film-made about the fate of four foreign tourists, two Britons, a German and an American, one Ibrahim was identified as a key militant behind the abduction of these tourists.

The security agencies are now probing whether this Ibrahim is the same man who is listed as one of the hijackers of the Indian Airlines plane to Kandahar.

There have been demands raised by the next of the kin of those four foreign hostages to their respective governments to find out from the hijackers about the fate of the abducted tourists.

The seized documents of the HUA in Jammu and Kashmir reveal extensive linkages of the group with wanted Saudi terrorist Osama bin Laden and some influential sections within the Taliban.

The HUA, which was put on a terrorist list by the US State Department in 1997 shared the Zilli Khawar terrorist training camp with Bin Laden’s cadres in Khost province on the Pak-Afghan border, which was a target for US cruise missile attacks last year.

Other militant groups operating in Kashmir have in the past raised ransom demands for the release of hostages and an unspecified sum was reportedly paid for the release of an Indian Oil executive recently.

Dry-run was probably conducted
Tribune News Service

CHENNAI, Dec 29 — The hijackers of the Indian Airlines IC 814 from Kathmandu probably conducted a dry-run a day before the hijacking actually took place.

This information was given to the Union Home Minister, Mr L.K. Advani by a passenger, who travelled from Kathmandu to Delhi by the Indian Airlines flight on December 23.

The passenger happened to meet Mr Advani in a Delhi-Chennai flight today by which the Union Home Minister was coming to attend the concluding session of the three-day national council session of the BJP.

Disclosing his conversation with the passenger aboard the commercial flight this morning, Mr Advani told delegates of the national council that he was informed that the security at Kathmandu was very lax and alarming.

The passenger told Mr Advani that while on his flight from Kathmandu to Delhi there was no checking of the passengers and he in fact noticed some five to six men moving under suspicious circumstances inside the plane. On hind sight, it appears that this could have been a dry-run by the hijackers, Mr Advani was told.

The man (whose name Mr Advani did not disclose) after his return from Kathmandu incidentally told his wife that night “that if anybody wants to hijack a plane then he should do it in Kathmandu”.

The Home Minister said he had got the details of the passengers and he would try to get his version verified.

Briefing the delegates about the government’s negotiations with the hijackers at Kandahar in Afghanistan, the Home Minister said they were progressing at a very slow pace but he was still hopeful that the government would be able to solve it.

He said a lot depends on the attitude of the Taliban Government in Afghanistan and their initial response had been positive. He said the Afghan Government’s statement that they would not allow any bloodshed in their country had prevented the hijackers from taking any adverse action.

On the criticism that the government delayed taking a decision on preventing the plane from leaving the Amritsar aiport, Mr Advani said he would not like to comment on it. He however, pointed out that during the time the plane was at the airport, the hijackers had not allowed the pilot to switch off the engine of the plane and they were in a state of readiness to fly.

Earlier, the national council of the BJP gave a call to all its members and supporters of the party all over the country to observe December 31 as a “day of national solidarity against terrorism”.

USA, China flay hijacking

NEW DELHI, Dec 29 (UNI) — Several countries, including the USA, Russia, China and Japan, have condemned the hijacking of the Indian Airlines airbus as a crime against humanity and appealed to the Taliban authorities to assist India in securing the release of the 154 hostages on board.

In a statement, the US State Department said it condemned the hijacking in the strongest possible terms and noted that one of the persons whose release was demanded by the hijackers — Masood Azhar — was affiliated to the Harkat-ul-Ansar designated by the US Government as a foreign terrorist organisation.

The statement by acting State Department spokesman Philip T. Rooker said, “We consider this terrorist act inhuman and we call for the immediate release of all hostages”.

It called on the Taliban authority and governments of the region to work in close coordination to end the hijacking drama and to restrict their public comments to those that served this objective.

Japan had also requested the Indian Government to make efforts for an early resolution of the incident.Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhang Qiyus said: “We are deeply concerned over the hijacking of an Indian Airlines plane by a group of terrorists. We hope the incident will be resolved as soon as possible.”