{"id":552,"date":"2014-02-17T11:29:26","date_gmt":"2014-02-17T11:29:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citi.hatuasolutions.com\/?p=552"},"modified":"2014-02-17T11:29:26","modified_gmt":"2014-02-17T11:29:26","slug":"co-pilot-hijacks-plane-to-seek-geneva-asylum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=552","title":{"rendered":"Co-pilot hijacks plane to seek Geneva asylum"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Passengers<\/a>
Passengers were escorted one by one into a waiting bus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The co-pilot of an Ethiopian Airlines plane flying from Addis Ababa to Rome has hijacked the aircraft and landed in Geneva, Swiss police say.<\/p>\n

The hijacker – who has been arrested – waited for the pilot to go to the toilet to lock himself in the cockpit. He was unarmed. He has requested asylum in Switzerland.<\/p>\n

The airline said in a statement that all 202 passengers and crew were safe.<\/p>\n

Geneva airport, which was closed for a time, has now reopened.<\/p>\n

An Ethiopian man born in 1983, the co-pilot has sought asylum due to fear of persecution in Ethiopia, police said at a news conference.<\/p>\n

After locking himself in the cockpit, he asked to refuel at Geneva, landed the plane, climbed down from the cockpit window using a rope (available in the cockpit), and gave himself up to police.<\/p>\n

He was unarmed and there was no risk at any time to crew or passengers, police said.<\/p>\n

The situation inside the plane remained calm throughout.<\/p>\n

The co-pilot himself alerted the authorities to the plane’s hijacking, officials added – and passengers on the plane were unaware it had been hijacked.<\/p>\n

The only possible offence the co-pilot could be charged with is that of hostage-taking, for which he could face up to 20 years of imprisonment, a Geneva prosecutor said at the news conference.<\/p>\n

Flight 702 was scheduled to leave the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, at 00:30 local time (21:30 GMT), and arrive in Rome at 04:40 local time.<\/p>\n

The Boeing 767-300 made an unscheduled landing in the Swiss city at 06:00.<\/p>\n

The evacuation of passengers began at about 07:25; they were all searched twice and have been questioned by police.<\/p>\n

The hijacking began over Italy, and two fighter jets – probably Italian – were scrambled to accompany the plane, Geneva airport chief executive Robert Deillon said at the news conference.<\/p>\n

The last hijacking to take place at Geneva airport was that of an Air Afrique plane in 1985.<\/p>\n

This incident is no doubt bad PR for Ethiopia Airlines, which has long prided itself as one of the continent’s best performing carriers, says BBC Addis Ababa correspondent Emmanuel Igunza.<\/p>\n

It reported $143m in operating profit in the last financial year. Other carriers recorded reduced profit margins or losses due to a combination of high fuel prices and the global economic recession, our correspondent adds.<\/p>\n

Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The co-pilot of an Ethiopian Airlines plane flying from Addis Ababa to Rome has hijacked the aircraft and landed in Geneva, Swiss police say. The hijacker – who has been arrested – waited for the pilot to go to the toilet to lock himself in the cockpit. He was unarmed. He has requested asylum in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":553,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-papa-owusu-ankomah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}