Sudan Jet With 199 Aboard Hijacked; Asylum Demanded

A Sudanese jetliner bound for Jordan with 199 passengers and crew members aboard was hijacked and forced to land in London today by a man claiming to have a hand grenade and dynamite.

The Airbus A-310 jetliner landed at 4:30 a.m. at Stansted, about 30 miles northeast of the British capital. Specially trained negotiators began talks with at least one unidentified hijacker shortly after the plane landed.

Kim White, a spokeswoman for Essex police, who handle airport security, said most of the passengers on board were Sudanese but that there were also an unknown number of Iraqis, Jordanians, Palestinians, Syrians and Saudis.

The nationality of the hijacker with whom negotiators spoke was not known. It was not immediately clear if there was more than one hijacker aboard the plane.

The jet, Sudan Airways Flight 150, was hijacked about 25 minutes after it left Khartoum, the Sudanese capital, Monday night en route to Amman, the capital of Jordan.

The plane first landed at Larnaca International Airport in Cyprus to refuel before being forced on to London. Cyprus aviation officials quoted the hijacker as saying he wanted political asylum in Britain.

Police in Cyprus negotiated with the hijacker for two hours but were unsuccessful in persuading him to free at least some passengers.

“One hijacker spoke to us,” said Glafcos Xenos, a police spokesman in the airport control tower at Larnaca. “He said, ‘I have a grenade and TNT. I only want the plane refueled and to go to London.’ ”

Egypt’s Middle East news agency MENA, in a dispatch from Khartoum, said Sudanese officials knew about the hijacking of the state-run plane but had no comment.