Seven hours with a fake bomb

Who is Saif Mustafa and why did he capture the Egyptian plane

On the afternoon of March 29, after seven hours of police negotiations, the hijacker of the Egyptair aircraft Saif Eldin Mustafa surrendered at the Larnaki Airport. The Egyptian threatened to act as an underwear, which actually turned out to be a dummy; At his request, the plane, flying from Alexandria to Cairo, sat in Cyprus. As it turned out later, the man wanted to see his wife and four children, from whom he left in the early 1990s. "Medusa" says that it is known about the theft of the aircraft and the invader himself.

Saif Mustafa - about 60 years old, he is a native of Egypt; His life is closely connected with Cyprus. In 1986, Mustafa got acquainted with the Cyprus of Marina Paraska and married her. In four years, they had five children (one of them died a few years ago in a car accident). In the early 1990s, Mustafa and Paraska divorced, and the man, according to his former wife, did not care about joint children.

According to the Kipriota publication, Newsbomb, Mustafa in the past supported the Front of the Liberation of Palestine and was an ardent supporter of Yasir Arafat. He participated in demonstrations in Larnac and was beaten by the police. In 1994, Mustafa was banned from appearing in Cyprus; Why exactly, reliably is unknown. Newsbomb writes that he was convicted in Egypt for four years in prison (the reason is unknown) and, possibly, had no right to travel outside the country. The Greek edition of Protothem writes that Mustafa was deported from Cyprus. At the trial, he himself stated that 24 years could not see his family through the fault of the Egyptian authorities.

Saif Mustafa announced the capture of the internal Egyptian flight, following from Alexandria to Cairo, 15 minutes after take -off. He went to the crew member, showed a belt imitating an explosive device, and a “detonator” in his hand; He announced the capture of the liner and asked everyone to hand over his passports. He ordered to inform the pilot about the seizure and asked to sit in Turkey, Greece or, more preferably, in Cyprus - most importantly, not in Egypt. The hijacker promised to blow himself up if the aircraft sits on the Egyptian territory.

As it turned out later, Mustafa collected the “bomb” from the buildings from iPhones, there were no explosives in it. The passengers did not know this and were frightened, but basically behaved calmly and did not panic. One of them called his wife and talked about the fact that he had a banking cash in the bank; After that, the passenger’s wife began to find out on the phone what it was for the bank, says the University of Alexandria Abdulla El-Ashmavi, who was among the hostages. The other passenger was worried about the frozen chicken, which was taken from him at the airport; Another woke up right before landing in Cyprus and was indignant that he would not have time to transplant, not realizing that the plane was captured.

Soon after landing at Cyprus at Larnaki Airport, Saif Mustafa began to let go of passengers. First, he allowed all the Egyptians to leave, leaving only the crew and foreigners on the plane. Then in the liner there were only four crew members and three passengers, subjects of Great Britain. One of them, Ben Inns, decided that there was nothing to lose anyway, and asked the hijacker to take a picture with him. Inns later said that he himself did not quite understand why he did this; However, while he was photographed with the invader, he realized that the “explosive device” does not look like the present - and calmed down.

At the seventh hour of negotiations, Mustafa released all the hostages and surrendered to the police.

The version of the terrorist attack of the power of Egypt and Cyprus practically did not consider. There are no exact details about how negotiations on the release of hostages were not, but it is known that soon after the landing at the airport of Larnaki, Mustafa demanded to transfer the letter to the resident of Kupra Marina Paraska. The special services established that we are talking about the ex -Egyptian wife, who was soon delivered to the airport and asked for negotiations with the hijacker. Mustafa threw a letter from the plane through the door, but in it, contrary to expectations, there was nothing personal-only political slogans and a list of women who were included in Egyptian prisons, which must be released. The Cyprus authorities did not adopt the claim of the hijacker seriously and stated that he was an emotionally unstable person, and the unnamed representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Egypt even described him as an “idiot, not a terrorist”.

Initially, the hijacker took a completely different person - the university professor Ibrahim Samahu, and even found his wife, but then it turned out that the teacher was only one of the passengers of the flight and had nothing to do with the seizure.

On March 30, the court in Cyprus decided to arrest Mustafa for eight days. This period later can be extended. He was officially charged with the theft of the vessel, threats of violence and the use of explosive devices, violation of the rules of air flights and the abduction of people. The prosecutor's office of Egypt has already requested the extradition of the hijacker. Leaving the court, Saif Mustafa showed reporters a sign of victory - two fingers up. While he is in the same country with children and his ex -wife.