Ethiopian plane hijacked by co-pilot, govt confirms
Tegegn, 31, had worked for Ethiopia's national carrier for five years, the minister said.
The Ethiopian government has confirmed that a hijacker who forced an Ethiopian Airlines plane to fly to Geneva earlier Monday had been the plane's co-pilot.
At a press conference, Redwan Hussein, government communication affairs office minister, confirmed that co-pilot Hailemedhin Abera Tegegn had forced the plane to change course for Geneva instead of Rome, its original destination.
Tegegn, 31, had worked for Ethiopia's national carrier for five years, the minister said.
Earlier Monday, Geneva airport official Robert Deillon told a press conference that the hijacker of the Boeing 767-600 – carrying 193 passengers, including 120 Italians – had been the plane's 31-year-old Ethiopian co-pilot.
The plane was hijacked over Sudanese airspace while en route to Rome from Addis Ababa. It was eventually forced to land at Geneva Airport with no injuries reported among passengers.
Deillon said the co-pilot had seized control of the plane when its lead pilot had been in the toilet.
After landing, the hijacker lowered himself from the plane by rope and handed himself over to police. He later testified that he had hijacked the plane with a view to seeking political asylum in Switzerland, Deillon said.
Ethiopian Airlines has seen several major accidents in recent decades.
The deadliest of these occurred in 1996, when a hijacked Boeing 767-200ER crashed into the Indian Ocean off the coast of the Comoros Islands – reportedly due to a lack of fuel – killing 125 passengers and crew members.
A second deadly crash took place in January 2010, when a Boeing 737-800 went down in flames in the Mediterranean Sea moments after taking off from Beirut airport. All 90 people on board were killed.
The 1988 crash of a Boeing 737-200 at Bahir Dar Airport in northwestern Ethiopia was the carrier's third deadliest accident in recent history, killing 35 of the 104 people on board.
englishnews@aa.com.tr
