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AL-KHOBAR, SAUDI ARABIA
After arriving in Saudi Arabia, the pilots locked themselves inside the cockpit and the hijackers freed all the women and children from the plane, airport officials said. They didn't say how many were released but the Saudi Press Agency reported 17 women, children and elderly were freed. |
About 15 others were later able to escape from the airplane's rear exit, the agency later reported, without providing details. The hijackers said they wanted to fly to Afghanistan, Saudi officials at the airport said. Abdul-Hamid Mishrif, operations manager at Medina airport, said "a young man who was hurt by the hijackers" was also freed and taken to a local hospital. Russian state RTR television in Moscow quoted deputy director of the Federal Security Service Vladimir Ponichev saying the man was a steward who was seriously wounded. There were conflicting reports about the number of hijackers. Turkish officials said there were two. But Ponichev told RTR radio contact between Saudi authorities and the hijackers showed there were four. A Saudi security official said there was no intention of raiding the plane. Ottawa was checking to see if any Canadians were on board the plane. GRAPHIC: photo by AP; An unidentified woman weeps while waiting for news at Vnukovo Airport in Moscow yesterday after a Russian plane was hijacked in Turkey and flown to Medina, Saudi Arabia. |
The Xinhua General Overseas News Service
MAY 21, 1987, THURSDAY
Syria Accuses U.S. of Deteriorating Bilateral Relations
Damascus -- Syria today criticized the U.S. decision not to send back its ambassador to Damascus and said Washington was responsible for deteriorating bilateral relations, according to radio Damascus. The radio indicated in a commentary that American accusations of Syrian support for terrorism were baseless and that Syria had never asked the U.S. to send back its ambassador. U.S. announced a few days ago not to send back its ambassador to Damascus, unless Syrian President Hafez Assad took some steps to prove that his government was no longer supporting acts of terrorism by closing down the office of Abu Nidal in Damascus or securing the release of some American hostages in Lebanon.
Abu Nidal, head of the Fatah revolutionary committee of the Palestine Liberation Organization, had threatened to sabotage American interests all over the world if Washington decided to hand over MOHAMED ATTA, a Palestinian arrested in New York, to the Israeli authorities on trial for murdering a bus driver in Israel. Syria will not submit to the American conditions, the commentary said, and the U.S. should quit its state terrorism and the provocative measures directed against Syria.