U.S. Offers Big Rewards in 2 Hijacking Cases

The United States, appealing for international help to combat air piracy, Thursday offered rewards of up to $250,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the terrorists who murdered three Americans in two Middle East hijackings since last December.

The rewards, announced by the State Department, were underscored later Thursday by the Justice Department, which unsealed criminal complaints and arrest warrants against three Lebanese Muslim suspects sought in the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 last June. In that case, U.S. Navy petty officer Robert D. Stethem, a passenger, was beaten and shot to death by the hijackers.

In announcing charges of murder and air piracy against the TWA hijackers, along with the reward, Atty. Gen. Edwin Meese III said the United States is signaling “a determined, coordinated effort . . . to bring those responsible for a notorious act of terrorism to justice.”

Stephen S. Trott, chief of the department’s criminal division, said the TWA case has been the subject of a monthslong federal grand jury investigation in Washington. But Trott said that arrest warrants for the three Lebanese are being made public because “countries standing by themselves do not have the capability to cope with the problem of international terrorism.”

Officials said the Justice Department lacks authority for a parallel investigation into the hijacking of Kuwaiti Airlines Flight 221 last Dec. 4. The terrorists aboard forced the plane to land in Tehran and subsequently murdered two American passengers, Charles Hegna and William Stanford, both employees of the U.S. Agency for International Development.

Unlike the TWA case, last December’s incident did not occur on a U.S.-chartered aircraft, and it happened before a new hostage-taking statute, passed by Congress, took effect Jan. 1, officials explained.

“We will use every legal weapon in our arsenal to track down and prosecute those who commit acts of international terrorism punishable under U.S. law,” Meese said in a statement. “We will not rest until the scourge of terrorism and the threat it poses to Americans here and abroad have been erased from the Earth.”

Klinghoffer Probe Continues

The rewards and criminal charges were revealed as the same Washington-based federal grand jury continued investigating the murder earlier this month of retired New York businessman Leon Klinghoffer by Palestinian terrorists who hijacked the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro.

Meese identified the TWA hijackers as Hasan Izz Din, Mohammed Hamadei and Ali Atwa, who Trott said are believed to be living in Beirut.

Trott added that the United States knows more about each of the men, but he declined to reveal any additional facts.

All are believed to be members of the radical Islamic group Hezbollah (Party of God). This is one of the groups suspected of bombing the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut two years ago, killing 241 American servicemen.

If the hijackers are found in a nation that has an extradition treaty with the United States, “we will file for their arrest and transfer to the United States for prosecution,” Trott said. If no formal extradition exists, “we will simply try to convince that country to turn them over to us,” he said.

The arrest warrants and criminal complaints were issued in U.S. District Court in Washington last July 3, shortly after the passengers of the TWA Flight 847, including 39 Americans, were released by their captors.

Trott declined to be specific when asked why the complaints and warrants were not announced until Thursday, saying only: “We had decided it was to our best tactical advantage to remain quiet. Now, we are determined to go public to enhance what has been going on, to step up our ability to combat terrorism.”