Threat to hostages at London airport

Press, 1 March 1982, Page 1

Threat to hostages at London airport

Four hijackers have threatened to kill all their 100 hostages aboard a Tanzanian Boeing 737 aircraft at Stansted Airport, near London, The aircraft was seized during a domestic flight over Tanzania and had stopped at Nairobi, Jeddah, and Athens on the way to London. The ■ hijackers, clutching grenades and guns and demanding the resignation of the Tanzanian President, Mr Julius Nyerere, threatened at one point during delicate negotiations by radio with the British police to blow up the aircraft. One of the gunmen blurted out after a police vehicle moved too close to the airliner: “We are going to blow the plane, we are going to die now. Bring 100 coffins now.” Soon after the plane arrived at Stansted, north-east of London, the hijackers

freed a pregnant woman and her son, aged five. They freed five women and children at Nairobi, and at Athens released the aircrafts only two non-Tanzanian passengers. a Belgian missionary and a Somali. The only person believed to have been injured so far is the co-pilot, who was treated by a doctor at Athens for a slight bullet wound in the waist. . Ariiied police ringed the airliner 100 metres from the . small terminal at the singlerunway Stansted Airport. Anti-terrorist troops were also reported to have been moved in but British officials said early yesterday there were no plans to storm the plane. British officials, blocked the runway with fire engines to stop the plane taking off and rejected* the hijackers’ demands for more fuel. Food

and water sent to the plane early yesterday were rejected by the gunmen and returned untouched. Officials made it clear they planned to wait and keep the hijackers talking. “The plan is to sit this out,” said the Essex County police chief, Mr Robert Bunyard, in charge of the negotiations. “I can see at the moment no way in. which the plane is going to leave,” he said. Another official said troops were at the airport if required but emphasised that the police were in charge. Troops of the elite Special Air Service (S.A.S.), who have trained in anti-terrorist techniques at the airport, were reported to be hidden near the twin-engined jet. . S.A.S. soldiers stormed the Iranian Embassy in London in June, 1980, and freed 19 hostages from gunmen who had taken over the building.