Indian Airlines Plane Hijacked

Militant freed by India in hijack deal in Pakistani Kashmir: witnesses

MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, Jan 4 (AFP) -

An Islamic militant freed last week by India in a deal with the hijackers of an Indian Airlines plane arrived in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir late Tuesday, witnesses said.

Mushtaq Ahmad Zargar was given a warm welcome by members of his guerrilla group, Al-Umar Mujahideen, in the state capital Muzaffarabad, they said.

Zargar and two other militants were released in exchange for 160 hostages to end the hijacking of the Airbus A300 at Kandahar airport in southern Afghanistan on December 31.

The five hijackers and the freed militants vanished from Kandahar, availing a safe passage by Afghanistan`s ruling Taliban militia as part of the swap.

India has said the hijackers are now in Pakistan. Islamabad has said the hijackers would be arrested and put on trial if they entered Pakistani territory.

Welcome banners were put up at several points in Muzaffarabad ahead of the arrival of Zargar, the founder of Al-Umar Muajahideen, one of the groups fighting Indian rule in Kashmir.

The banners read ``No retreat, no surrender`` and ``Kashmir will become part of Pakistan.``

India holds two-thirds of the Himalayan state of Kashmir, and Pakistan the remainder. The dispute between the two over its ownership has caused two of the three wars between the two countries since 1947.

Zargar, in his late 30s, is described by India as one of the founding fathers of militancy in Indian Kashmir, which has been rocked by a Muslim separatist insurgency since 1989.

He was jailed several times in India.

In 1983, Zargar was imprisoned in connection with a blast in Bombay. He was again arrested in 1984 for working with Al Maqbool, a militant organization, but released two years later.

Al Maqbool was named after Mohammad Maqbool Butt, a pro-independence Kashmiri leader who was hanged in a New Delhi prison by the Indian government in February 1984.

Zargar went underground in 1987 and founded Al-Umar in 1988.

According to guerrilla sources, Zargar crossed the Line of Control that divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan many times after founding the Al-Umar group.

He was in prison in Srinagar in Indian Kashmir when he was freed.

In other news 5 ISI agents have been arrested in Mumbai.

Here is a link to India Today that gives a more detailed view of the Hijacking than western media.

http://www.india-today.com/itoday/20000110/cover.html

umairr:

read your post again -

afghani minister said `they are not in afghanistan. we are not bound to tell where they went.`

dawn`s interpretation of this -

`afghanistan refutes indian claim`.

great reporting of facts!

Can somebody please answer a number of disturbing questions which have emerged during the hostage crisis

1. Why did the Indian authorities allow the plane to leave Amritsar. Without refuelling they knew that the plane could only go to Pakistan.

2. Who instigated the rumour that 4 passengers had been killed when the plane was in Amritsar.

3. Why did the Indian authorities take so long to send a negotiating team to Afghanistan.

4. Why have the Induan authorities failed to give details of the hijackers to Pakistan to help them to capture them if they try to enter the country.

5. If India really had proof that Pakistan was behind the hijacking then surely they would release this information instead of grabbing tabloid headlines with wild accusations

Maybe if somebody can provider answers to these questions then it will help to dispell the widely held view that India has carried out a propanda operation against its neighbour which has now backfired.

Hijack fallout

FOR the five hijackers of the Indian Airlines jet, terrorism pays, and, much as India`s Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee hates to admit it, the hijack has landed him in a bad fix. To put it bluntly, he has to pay dearly for the incompetence and misjudgement of his government`s handling of the crisis. The point is this: There was a serious security lapse, his government was slow to respond, and it was a bad decision to let the commandeered aircraft fly out of the Indian city of Amritsar. The Airbus eventually ended up in Kandahar, Afghanistan, in a territory where India has no control. Yes, the New Delhi government managed to knock down the hijackers` original demands to secure the release of 36 of their comrades in Indian jails and a US$200 million (S$330 million) ransom in exchange for the freedom of the 155 hostages aboard the commandeered airliner. Mercifully, only one person was killed. Despite this, it cannot but still be said that Mr Vajpayee`s government had botched it.

The hijackers clean got away with their quarry. They won the release of three jailed Islamic militants, including Maulana Masood Azhar, the Pakistani leader of the Harkat ul Mujahidin organisation, a Kashmir separatist group. Now Mr Vajpayee is being assailed by the opposition parties and critics for making a deal with them. To be sure, the Indian government was caught flat-footed, and things were made worse with the hijacked aircraft stranded in a country ruled by a government it does not recognise. As a reluctant host, the Taleban authorities wanted the hijackers out of Kandahar at the earliest opportunity. Now India is unhappy with them for letting the hijackers get way. India`s relations with the Taleban are a separate issue. What is worrisome are the repercussions of the hijack. There has been a marked increase in the activities of Kashmiri militants after the incursion of Kargil, which almost led India and Pakistan to a new war. The bomb that went off on Monday in a market in Srinagar killed 17 people and wounded 31. The Christmas Eve hijack, which ended last Friday after an eight-day ordeal for the passengers, could well encourage the Islamic militants to plan more adventures against India. It could also fuel further unrest in Indian-controlled Kashmir. New Delhi has accused Pakistan of involvement in the Airbus hijack, and Mr Vajpayee has called on the world community to declare Pakistan a terrorist state. In the absence of conclusive evidence, no country is likely to take up his suggestion. His attack on Islamabad may help to deflect domestic criticisms of his government, but that is all. Left unchecked, the war of words and mutual recriminations between the two neighbours, which now have nuclear weapons, can only get worse. This makes their quarrel dangerous because things can get out of hand, particularly when domestic political pressures mount on both governments over the issue.

Islamabad has denied vehemently all the Indian claims that the five masked hijackers had sought refuge in Pakistan. Its military government has said it would arrest and try them if they were caught in Pakistan, and it has denied India`s allegations that they were Pakistanis. Whatever the sequel to this unhappy episode, the lesson to learn from the hijack is an old one. There is nothing except eternal vigilance to hold terrorists anywhere at bay. It takes plenty of resources and effort, but there is no other way. It is not easy. But better this than to get caught in a vise like the Indian government was.



The Strait Times

According to a news published in Dawn Internet Edition (Jan 5, 2000), Director General ISPR Brig. Rashid Qureshi has said that neither the Taliban nor Pakistan knew about the whereabouts of the hijackers. ``Only India knows about them. This means, they are in contact with India,`` he said.

Is this an example of poor public relations work? Only Taliban and India were two major partners in the whole ordeal. At least, Taliban should know the whereabouts of the hijackers. How could Brig. Qureshi claims that Talibans have no knowledge about the whereabouts of the hijackers?

Sincerely, Bilal Ahmad

dear bahmad:

who has seen the hijackers` faces?



it would be logical to assume that the three `freedom fighters` released from indian jails would know who the hijackers are.

now that two of these `freedom fighters` are in pakistan, i wonder if international laws would require pakistan to interrogate them to find out who the hijackers were and where they might be now.

pakistan has promised that if the hijackers enter pakistan they would be arrested and tried. for this to happen, pakistan first has to find out who the hijackers are. do you think pakistan is going to question the two `freedom fighters`?

Re: bahmad Reply #: 134

THE REDOUBTABLE BRIG. QURESHI

Dear Bilal,

Please do not malign Brig. Qureshi. He brings much needed comic relief to us Indians in these trying times !

The biggest joke among Indians recently was the upright Brigadier`s statement that the hhijackers and the released militants would be arrested if found in Pakistan !!!

This was followed a few days later by the statement ``Masood may be allowed into pakistan, after all he is a pakistani citizen and he has done no crime here, but only if he can prove that he is the `real` Masood`` !!!

My all-time favorite Quereshi-quip is: The Indian army had just captured the Tiger Hill during the kargil conflict. Our man reported ``This is just another baseless Indian propoganda - I have checked and found that there is no Tiger Hill on MY map `` ! Priceless !!!!

regards,

AN

In response to concerned (Reply # 136)

Dear concerned:

I can`t believe that nobody knows who the hijacker were/are? Is Nepal such a backward country that its airport is not equipped with video cameras?

Sincerely, Bilal Ahmad

Freed militant stirs rebels

KARACHI, Pakistan -- One of three Kashmiri militants freed as part of a deal to end the hijacking of an Indian Airlines jetliner called on his followers Wednesday to destroy India and the United States.

Maulana Masood Azhar gave a fiery speech to 10,000 Pakistani supporters who gathered in front of a central Karachi mosque.``I have come here because this is my duty to tell you that Muslims should not rest in peace until we have destroyed America and India,`` Azhar said, vowing to liberate the Kashmir region from Indian rule.

Although Pakistani officials earlier said the hijackers would be arrested if they stepped foot in their country, there was no effort to detain Azhar.

All five hijackers have been identified



The Indian government Thursday announced it had identified the five hijackers of IC 814, all of them Pakistanis.

Indian Home Minister L K Advani, at a press conference in New Delhi, said the photographs of the five men who had commandeered the Indian Airlines plane to Kandahar in Afghanistan had been shown to the hostages who had identified every single one of them.

The five hijackers of IC 814 , all of them Pakistanis were were Ibrahim Akhtar (from Bhawalpur), Syed Akhtar Syed (Gulshaniqbal area, Karachi), Sumi Ahmed Qari (defence area, Karachi), Mistry Zahoor Ibrahim (Karachi) and Shaqir (Sakkar, Sindh).

Authorities in India had arrested four activists of the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen who had provided a support base for the hijackers. With their arrest, the government was in possession of irrefutable evidence and documents that revealed ``Pakistan`s neck-deep involvement in the dirty game of hijacking.``

The conspiracy to hijack the aircraft was hatched by the four headed by Abdul Latif from Bombay, two months back. The three others are Mohammed Rehan (Karachi), Mohammad Iqbal (Multan) and Yusuf Nepali (Nepal).

Mr. Advani described it as a significant breakthrough in showing Pakistan`s involvement in the incident. He said Latif, who had been to one of the Gulf nations and was trained in Pakistan and Afghanistan, took principal hijacker Ibrahim Akhtar from Bombay to Calcutta on November one. From there they went to New Jalpaiguri in West Bengal and then to Kathmandu, Nepal.

Latif also accompanied another hijacker Shaqir to Nepal on December one via Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh in North India.

Indian police achieved the breakthrough when they intercepted a message to Latif from a Pakistani contact, directing him to get in touch with a television correspondent and give the information that if the hijackers` demand was not met they would blow up the plane.

dear bahmad:

`Is Nepal such a backward country that its airport is not equipped with video cameras`

i wonder if any country videotapes the passengers going into every aircraft. there may be video cameras in the departure lounge, however those would cover all the passengers going into all the flights leaving from kathmandu. it would be difficult to determine who boarded what flight.

the people who definitely know the hijackers are the released `freedom fighters`. of course, maulana masood azhar has now said that the hijackers told him that he doesn`t know them and that they were indians. so i guess pakistan doesn`t have to question the maulana.

I think if India wants everyone to get a clear picture of the hijacking, it should make public the transcript of the negotiations that India carried out with the hijackers in Afghanistan. It should also make public the Air Traffic Control conversations between the hijackers and the airport authorities in Amritsar. Without doing that, I am not quite sure how India expects everyone to believe its claims. First India said the hijackers were going to Quetta, now apparently the Indian govt. has stated that they have captured the hijackers`or their partners in Bombay.

``Indian Home Minister LK Advani said the four were arrested in Bombay and included two Pakistanis, a Nepalese and one Indian, and that as a result, the Indian authorities had now been able to identify the hijackers.`` (reported by BBC)

Unfortunately for India, the rest of world has not indicated that it believes the Indian propoganda. I think it would help the Indian govt. if it came out of its state of denial, and accepted its own failiures in this hijacking, instead of trying to blame Pakistan.

Is it true that Maulana Azhar had been held for six years in an Indian jail, without a conviction?

Pakistan has taken the killing of 23 aircrew on the unarmed Naval aircraft inside Pakistan, by India, to the International Court of Justice. India so far has refused to agree to the ICJ hearing that case. I think India should take its claims of Pakistan`s hijacking to the ICJ also. I doubt it will do that, because so far the only evidence India has presented are false baseless statements by its govt. and media.

Lal Advani`s statement on BBC: One of the hijackers is from Defence, Karachi :)

Re: vineet #139

(``Although Pakistani officials earlier said the hijackers would be arrested if they stepped foot in their country, there was no effort to detain Azhar.``)

You must realize that this particular statement makes no sense. Azhar was obviously not one of the hijackers. Arresting him makes no legal sense, since even in India, where he was kept in prison for six years, he was never convicted by any Indian court.

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/south/01/06/india.hijacking.arrest.01/index.html

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/south/01/06/india.hijacking.arrest.01/link.athar.jpg

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/south/01/06/india.hijacking.arrest.01/link.qazi.jpg

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/south/01/06/india.hijacking.arrest.01/link.mistri.ibrahinjpg

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ASIANOW/south/01/06/india.hijacking.arrest.01/link.shahid.akhtar.jpg

Pictures of the hijackers and identified them as Ibrahim Athar from the Pakistani city of Bahawalpur,

Shahid Akhtar Sayed, Sunny Ahmed Qazi and Mistri Zahoor Ibrahim, all from Karachi, and Shaqir from Sukkur city.

Temporal:

They couldnt have boarded the plane wearing monkey caps. If shown photographs, I`m sure staff and passengers on the plane and at kathmandu airport terminal may be able to recall them. And if they are the wrong people, surely it will be easy for the real people who match the photographs and names to point out the falsity of the accusation. As a first step, do people with these names, photos and hometowns exist? The Govt of India has put itself out on a limb - they have put very specific facts out which are subject to refutation. This could be all a complete hog-wash but your accusation of Goebbelian tactics seems to point to the fact that you are not even willing to entertain the idea that these hijackers were Pakistani (not that that implicates the govt).

Second, Maulana Azhar, the ``cleric`` who was ``pained`` to see innocent people suffer in order to get his release has, in a public meeting in Karachi, claimed, with approval, the hijackers are onto their next endeavour in Indian Kashmir. A small little hypocrite perhaps with a following of 15,000 or more in the crossroads of Karachi. Or is this also a continuation of the master Goebbelian RAW plot allowing the plane to take off from Amritsar?

Pakistan, a country with a narrow mono-religious vision cannot understand a multi-religious, multi-cultural country like India, and provides moral, political and armed support to undermine a beautiful idea, a beautiful vision of India. These are the jehadis who come across the border, steeped with self-righteousness because they have it directly from God.