Osama planning attacks on New Delhi
Kathmandu, Nov. 9:
Nepal has imposed strict security around the Kathmandu international airport after receiving information that a cell linked to Osama Bin Laden was planning to hijack a Singaporean airliner emanating from Chennai and crash it into New Delhi, officials said Friday.
Chennai police had told Nepalese authorities they had 'credible information' a Bin Laden cell was planning such an attack, said Jaya Diwan, general secretary of Nepal ' s foreign airline operators ' association.
'We are taking precautionary measures so that this kind of ugly thing does not happen,' Diwan said. Diwan said Nepal had received all its information about the plot from India.
Officials said that although the threat was made to Singapore Airlines, which runs flights from Singapore to Chennai to Kathmandu, all air carriers in Kathmandu were being told to take extra precautions.
All passengers entering Kathmandu airport were being thoroughly checked, officials said. Kedar Koirala, a senior security official at the Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu, said the security at the airport was tightened after the threat.
The Kathmandu Post also quoted an anonymous letter received by the authorities as saying that Bin Laden ' s men were already in Nepal ' s capital and planned to hijack a plane and crash it into one of three targets in India Ñ the US embassy in New Delhi, the office of the Prime Minister or his residence.
The English-language daily said the handwritten letter was mailed from Chennai, and warned authorities of a 'possible plot by members of Osama Bin Laden ' s group' to hijack an airliner flying from Kathmandu.
The Union Home Ministry in New Delhi said it had no information about such a threat.
Kedar Koirala said body searches of passengers had been intensified and baggage was being physically searched after an X-ray examination. 'A security search inside the aircraft is also being conducted when necessary,' Koirala added.
Nepal and India were among the countries that gave early support to the US-led strikes on Afghanistan, which is sheltering Saudi-born Bin Laden, the prime suspect in the September 11 suicide hijack attacks on the United States.
Kathmandu has also pledged to open its airspace and refuelling facilities to US aircraft conducting raids on targets in Afghanistan.
Kashmiri militants hijacked an Indian Airlines aircraft to Kandahar in Afghanistan in December 1999. The plane was on a flight from Kathmandu to New Delhi.
newstodaynet.com
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