ARAB HIJACKINGS HIDE RED THEFT PLOT, EXPERT SAYS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01350R000200560004-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Sequence Number: 4
• Content Type: NEWSPAPER CLIPPING

Approved For Release 2006/06/19: CIA-RD 88 TO1350R00020059999 9
puILA~LELPEIxA, PA.
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867,81.0
LONDON (AP). ---The Arab : Martinez Fernandez from
skyjacking of four Western Colombia. A fourth was a,
airliners last year was part of Costa Rican student Alvara '
a worldwide Communist plot T..,...:.... ., - L _
Alliance?documents to the So- said. ways jumbo jet, hijacked to
yiet Union, a British spy book Even Leila Khaled, the girl Cairo on a.Sept. 7 flight from
claimed Monday. guerilla briefly jailed in 13ri- Amsterdam to New York
Pouches containing top tain after she failed to cap- ,they
caplurec1 a mass of
secret reports on a NATO air- tore an Israeli El Al plane NATO documents concerning
budget were taken off the over the English- Channel, toll-secret plans for the toll -
planes before they were blown may have been born in Hon- Wiled NATO air and naval
tip at. Cairo airport and in the duras, Cookridge indicated, exercises code-named 'Win-
sands of the Jordanian desert, The name on her passport, he fex"," set for 1971, said
H. Codkridge, a Vienna-born Chaves, and she speaks Span- The Central-..4ntelligence
I espionage specialist,
ish. Agency, he went on, later dis
The September skyjackings-- Leila's accomplice, shot cosoeed that the Wintex plank
and a fifth attempt which. dead b; Israeli security had been delivered to Col.
failed in a blaze of gunfire ' guards while the plane was in Samih Sharraf, the Egyptian
intelligence chief, and given
above the English Channel-- flight, ti as Nicaraguan, born
flashed the world spotlight on Patrick Aneuello an Ameri- to the. Soviet Embassy in
the Arab guerillas of the can citizen.) ~ Cairo.
Marxist-Maoist Popular Front. I'll. I-A nothin
The papers were photogra-
to do
itl
g
t
w
for the Liberation of Palest- Arab nationalism o he was plied and the pouches slashed'
ine, who did the job. The or and burned to resemble ex-
--, a professional Communist ganization has now virtually went and his involvement plosion damage. Then they
were delivered to the Amerl-
vanished from the Arab scene, with the 11FLP was only inci-
r The air piracy had little to dentalthe book says. can Embassy in Cairo with
formal Egyptian regrets. The
do' with Arab nationalism, Cookridge did not specify Wirttex maneuvers were
claimed "Spy Trade," which the precise purposes of the
contended: "It was, in fact, alleged . Communist plot. But
part of a worldwide Commu- he said one effect of the hi-
fist Conspiracy,. zlthough not jacking was the seizure of the
necessarily 'stage-managed secret NATO papers.
from Moscow. From a I'an American Air-
"Hardly any of the actual
skyjackers were Palestinians
or Arabs," said Cookridge.
,The book is likely to pro
` voke Arab denials from the
Middle East, where th el
skyjackers are regarded as
Palestinian heroes and bona-
fide Arabs.
Tivo of the air bandits were
Africans from Senegal, said
Cookridge, a World War IT
intelligence agent and author
of half a dozen books on
k spying. .
Another was Miss Cecilia
canceled.
From a Trans World . Air-
lines 707, hijacked and blown'
up in Jordan, the skyjackers'
took NATO . documents en`"
route from Supreme Head
quarters Allied Powers in Fii-
rope (SITAFT7,) to the Pent
on in Washington, the book
s,aid. . .
These were given to Rllis
slan agents in Damascus, alid
Cookridge comments: "It
was a good catch: They coil-
tainad -a complete set of
documents of the NATO niili-
tary budget for 1971."
"The groat skyjack open--
ation of - September 19701 already half forgotten," cail-
tioned Cookridge. He warned
that "in the area of intelli-
gence and military limbs of
government the drama .le
mains an ominous pointer. tc,
MORIICDF
Approved For Release 2006/06/19: CIA-RDP88-01350R000200560004-9