KHARTOUM, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- The Sudanese government
is holding intensive contacts with Libya on a Sudanese passenger plane which was
hijacked to Libya from the restive western Sudanese region of Darfur on Tuesday.
"Intensive contacts are being held with the Libyan
authorities on how to deal with the hijack issue," the Sudanese Civil Aviation
Authority announced in an urgent statement.
It said the plane, a Boeing 737, belonged to Sunair,
a Khartoum-based private airline, and was carrying 87 passengers besides 8 crew
members when it was hijacked.
The plane, which was on a routine flight between
Niyala and Khartoum took off from the Niyala Airport in South Darfur State
at17:30 local time (14:30 GMT) but was hijacked 30 minutes later.
The statement did not mention the number of the
hijackers, nor the motives behind the action.
Meanwhile, a spokesman of the Sudan Liberation
Movement (SLM)-Minawi Faction said three of their senior members were aboard the
hijacked plane.
The SLM-Minawi Faction signed a peace agreement with
the Sudanese government in 2006 while most of the other rebel groups refused the
peace deal, demanding more compromises from the government.
The spokesman, Mohammed Bashir, said the three
persons included an adviser of the former rebel group's leader Mini Arkou Minawi
and one of the designers of the 2006 Darfur Peace Agreements.
Libya's Civil Aviation Authority confirmed the plane
had landed at al-Kufrah, an oasis town in the country's southeast, Libya's state
news agency Jana reported.
The Dubai-based Al Arabiya TV said the plane flew to
al-kufrah to refuel and the hijacker wanted the plane to fly to Cairo.
The Egyptian state news agency MENA quoted Sunair as
saying four men hijacked the plane. It said the Egyptian authorities have denied
the permission for the plane's landing.
CAIRO, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- The hijacked Sudanese passenger
plane did not send any request to enter the Egyptian airspace, head of the
Egyptian Civil Aviation Authority (ECAA) said on Tuesday hours after the hijack.
The pilot of the hijacked airliner did not contact the
Egyptianair traffic towers to ask for entering Egypt's airspace and landing in
any Egyptian airport, the Egyptian official MENA news agency quoted ECAA chief
Emad Salam as saying.
KHARTOUM, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- A Sudanese passenger
plane which was hijacked on Tuesday at Niyala, the capital city of South Darfur
State in the restive western Sudanese region of Darfur, has landed in Libya,
Qatar's al-Jazeera TV reported.
The plane, which was hijacked after taking off at the
Niyala airport flying toward Khartoum, has landed at Al-Kafra Airport, according
to the report.
KHARTOUM, Aug. 26 (Xinhua) -- An airplane was hijacked
Tuesday after taking off from Nyala, capital city of Sudan's south Darfur state,
the pan-Arab al-Jazeera TV reported.
The plane was flying from Nyala to Sudan's capital of
Khartoum,the report said.
