Kidnap trial opens tomorrow

Press, 4 January 1988, Page 6

Kidnap trial opens tomorrow

NZPA-AP Frankfurt A kidnapping trial opening this week amid tight security will explore Middle-East terrorism, and may provide an inside look at the 1985 hijacking of a TWA jetliner. Abbas Ali Hamadi will go on trial tomorrow in Dusseldorf, charged with kidnapping two West German businessmen in Beirut. Prosecutors say the kidnapping was aimed at forcing West Germany to free his brother, Mohammed Ali Hamadi, a suspect in the dramatic TWA hijacking to Beirut that left a United States navy sailor dead. Mohammed Hamadi, arrested at Frankfurt Airport last January for carrying explosives, will be tried later. West Germany’s refusal to extradite the 23-year-old Shi’ite Muslim to the United States strained relations between Washington and Bonn. While the trial of Abbas

Hamadi, aged 29, will focus on the kidnappings, it also will delve into his younger brother’s role in the complicated events. “As things are now planned, Mohammed Ali Hamadi will be questioned about his own actions some time in January,” said a Dusseldorf court spokesman, Klaus Forsen. Abbas Hamadi was arrested at Frankfurt airport on January 26, 1987, when he arrived on a flight from Beirut. 'He is being tried on charges of trying to blackmail the West German Government, hostage-tak-ing and having illegal explosives. He faces a minimum of three years in prison if convicted. The indictment says he helped arrange the January 17, 1987, kidnapping of Rudolf Cordes and the abduction of Alfred Schmidt three days later. Mr Schmidt was freed on September 7, but Mr Cordes is still a hostage.