Ethiopia Airlines plane hijacked by co-pilot

GENEVA, Switzerland

The skyjacked Ethiopian Airlines plane was seized by its co-pilot who wanted asylum in Switzerland, an official from Geneva Airport said Monday.

Geneva airport official, Robert Deillon told a press conference that the hijacker of the plane was its 31-year-old co-pilot of Ethiopian origin.

Earlier in the day, an Ethiopian Airlines passenger plane, en route from Addis Ababa to Rome, was hijacked while flying over Sudan.

The airliner was forced to land at Geneva Airport and no injuries were reported because of the incident. Deillon said the hijacker seized control of the plane when its lead pilot was at the toilet.

After the plane's landing, the 31-year-old descended to the ground by using a rope and gave himself over to the police. He testified that he hijacked the plane to seek asylum in Switzerland, Deillon said.

Over the past decades, Ethiopian Airlines has had some major accidents. The airline's most disastrous accident occurred in November 1996, when a hijacked Boeing 767-200ER crashed into the Indian Ocean, off the coast of the Comoros Islands, due to lack of fuel, killing 125 of the 175 passengers and crew on board.

The second deadliest crash took place in January 2010 and involved a Boeing 737-800 that had gone down in flames in the Mediterranean sea moments after takeoff from Beirut airport, killing the 90 people on board.

The September 1988 crash of a Boeing 737-200 at Bahir Dar Airport in northwestern Ethiopia ranks as the carrier's third deadliest accident, resulting in the death of 35 out of 104 people on board.

englishnews@aa.com.tr