Britain to Join in Boycott of Beirut Airport

Britain and the United States agreed today to join in fighting the “evil” of air terrorism by pressing for an international boycott of the Beirut airport.

Announcement of the agreement followed a meeting between Vice President George Bush and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who also suggested that Beirut airport authorities shared complicity with the hijackers of TWA Flight 847.

Thatcher, in an impromptu news conference outside her offices at 10 Downing Street, said the United States and Britain “declared their determination to work together with all like-minded states in combatting this evil” of air piracy.

She also announced that officials of the seven Western economic summit nations will meet at a special session in Bonn next week to map a strategy to combat terrorism.

‘Interests Identical’

Thatcher said the TWA hijacking, in which 39 Americans were held for 17 days, was different from previous acts of air piracy. She said Beirut airport is being singled out for action because the TWA hijacking showed that “in that particular case, the airport’s and the hijackers’ interests appeared to be identical.”

Bush told reporters that the communique reflected “our common purpose” in wiping out “the scourge of international terrorism.”

“The President of the United States, in appointing me to head a United States task force on this, recognizes that no country alone can do the job,” he added.

In Britain, Thatcher said, “we have shared the joy of the United States that the hostages have been returned to their families and the sorrow that one of them, a United States Marine (he was actually a Navy man), lost his life during that hijacking.”

‘Must Be Stopped’

In a joint statement issued after their meeting, Britain and the United States declared, “Terrorism and the threat it poses to civilized and democratic peoples must be stopped.”

They said the suspension of services to and from Beirut airport will be part of a package of measures to combat terrorism, particularly against civil aviation.

Bush, completing a seven-nation West European tour dominated by the June 14 hijacking of TWA flight 847, was to return to Washington later in the day.

Security for Bush’s London visit was tight, with a police helicopter hovering overhead as his nine-car motorcade arrived at Downing Street with an escort of police vehicles.