Hijackers likely to get asylum

Press, 5 October 1977, Page 8

Hijackers likely to get asylum

NZPA-Reuter Algiers The 11 Japanese Red Army terrorists — five hijackers and six freed prisoners — who left a hijacked Japan Air Lines jet in Algiers will probably be given temporary asylum until they can leave’ Algeria with minimum publicity, according to observers. They pointed to Algeria’s record as reluctant host to hijackers refused asylum by other countries, most notably the commando led by top terrorist Carlos, “The Jackal,” which seized Oil Ministers from a Vienna conference in 1975. The bloodless end to a 134 hr drama that began over Bombay last Wednesday was at least the fifth time that hostages have been freed and hijackers sheltered in Algiers. Observers said Algeria’s motive in such affairs was unwillingness to appear hostile to revolutionary causes. Thus it had become a kind of international policeman, settling incidents for third parties.

Though the 11 terrorists will probably be freed, it is possible that the S6M ransom they extracted from the Japanese Government will be handed back.

In 1972, Algeria served as mediator when American Black Panther Terrorists landed with a SSM ransom.

j Several months later the 'money was returned to the ■American Government, even 'though diplomatic relations between the two countries were broken at the time. A Japanese Embassy I spokesman in Algiers said his Government had not been told the terms on which the hijackers had agreed to come to Algeria and surrender their remainring 19 hostages. “We are riot in a position to ask,” he said. But official sources in Tokyo said the Japanese Government would not seek the extradition of the guerrillas or the released prisoners. United Press International reports that in Tokyo, the Japanese Prime Minister (Mr Takeo Fukuda) said that the question of asking Algeria to give back the 11 fugitives and the money was “still undecided.”

The Japanese police said the point of the hijacking was to pump more money and manpower into the Red Army, a tiny group believed to comprise not more than about 40 extremists.