Six hijackers divert Chinese plane

Press, 7 May 1983, Page 8

Six hijackers divert Chinese plane

NZPA-Reuter Seoul South Korea announced yesterday that it would deal with six hijackers of a Chinese civilian airliner under international air-piracy laws. The plane,, seized on an internal flight from Manchuria with 105 passengers and crew, landed at an American air base north of Seoul on Thursday after a mid-air shooting during which two crew members were wounded. The Deputy Information Minister, Mr Huh Mun-Do, said South Korea would conform with international laws regarding air terrorism. South Korean officials said the hijackers burst into toe flight deck about an hour after take-off from Shenyang in Manchuria on a scheduled flight to Shanghai. Brandishing pistols, they ordered the pilot to fly to Taiwan but he diverted the plane to North Korea and apparently attempted to land at Pyongyang, the capital. The British-built Trident circled Pyongyang several times before toe hijackers forced the pilot to change course for the demilitarised zone (DMZ) bordering South Korea, officials said. The entry of the Chinese airliner into South Korean air space triggered an invasion alert in which civildefence officials interrupted radio programmes to warn of an imminent air attack. The announcement was cancelled a few minutes later without explanation. The hijackers shot out the locks on the security door to the flight deck to gain entry. The navigator and the radio operator were wounded in the legs. The injured crew were flown to Seoul by helicopter

and were in stable condition after surgery. Nearly eight hours after the airliner landed at Chunchon, north-east of Seoul, the six hijackers, including one woman, handed over their weapons and surrendered. It was the first successful hijacking from China since the Communists took power there in 1949. Last year passengers armed with lemonade bottles overcame a group of would-be hijackers trying to force a Chinese plane to fly to Taiwan. In Peking yesterday China demanded the return of the airliner, its passengers and crew after its seizure by “armed terrorists.” An official said South Korea was considering the demand.