Won’t Extradite Terrorist, Bonn Indicates

The West German government apparently has refused a U.S. request to extradite a suspected Arab terrorist accused of murder in the 1985 hijacking of a TWA jetliner and will prosecute him, a White House official said today.

West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, in a discussion with President Reagan on Tuesday night, “left the President with the impression they would not extradite” the suspect, Mohammed Ali Hamadi, though the U.S. government had received no official notification that such a decision had been reached, the official said.

The official indicated that the United States is not completely satisfied with the apparent decision but is pleased that Bonn plans to prosecute Hamadi--arrested at the Frankfurt airport Jan. 13 while trying to smuggle explosives into West Germany--on a murder charge.

U.S. officials had feared that Kohl might yield to public demand and trade Hamadi and his brother, Abbas Ali, who is also being held, for two West German businessmen held hostage in Beirut. Reports have circulated that Hamadi could be tried on a lesser charge, such as possession of explosives, and freed after six months.

“We would have preferred extradition, but it really is important that the West Germans are committed to prosecuting” Hamadi on the murder charge, said the official, who spoke on the condition that he not be identified.

An agreement reached by the President and the leaders of six other leaders at the Venice economic summit conference, which ended Wednesday, stressed the need for countries to extradite suspected terrorists or try them on the full charges involved in their alleged crimes in the global fight against terrorism.

In Washington on Wednesday, U.S. officials said that the West German government had assured the State Department that it will either extradite or prosecute Hamadi. Bonn officials also agreed to permit several American witnesses from TWA Flight 847 to view Hamadi in a lineup for purposes of identification to bolster the U.S. extradition request, Administration sources said.

“We have been assured that the German government will fulfill its responsibilities to extradite or try Hamadi for the seizure of TWA Flight 847 and the murder of U.S. Navy Petty Officer Robert Stethem,” State Department spokeswoman Phyllis Oakley said.

Secretary of State George P. Shultz had said a day earlier that he had assurances that Hamadi would be “brought to justice” but had no guarantee that he would be charged with the hijacking and murder.

The Reagan Administration, which has privately voiced impatience at West Germany’s failure to move faster in the case, arranged to send the U.S. witnesses in an effort to speed the judicial process. Joseph E. diGenova, U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, will take the witnesses to West Germany within a week under heavy security, sources said.

The arrangement was made during discussions this week in Bonn between West German officials and a U.S. delegation that included Associate Atty. Gen. Stephen S. Trott and Deputy Asst. Atty. Gen. Victoria Toensing, who had pressed for extradition.

Under the terms of a 1976 anti-terrorist treaty sponsored by West Germany in the United Nations, a signatory nation arresting the perpetrator of a hijacking anywhere in the world must either try the prisoner or extradite him to the country where the hijacking took place or whose nationals or aircraft were involved.

The Administration requested extradition immediately after Hamadi was seized, but concern was raised in West Germany that he could receive a death sentence in the United States, a punishment banned by the Bonn constitution.

James Gerstenzang reported from Venice and Don Shannon from Washington. Staff writer Ronald J. Ostrow contributed in Washington to this story.