Hijacking: A Victory for Terrorism

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Few Western observers were persuaded by Moscow's protestations. "The connection between this terrorist activity and the Soviet Union is what really struck Europeans," said Dominique Moisi, deputy director of Paris' Institut Francais des Relations Internationales. "The Afghan regime and the Soviet Union connived at supporting an act of blatant international terrorism," charged Paul Wilkinson, professor of international relations at Scotland's University of Aberdeen.

Some of the most damning evidence of possible Soviet-Afghan complicity was provided by freed passengers afterward. Said Stewardess Naila Aziz: "The hijackers had only hand grenades and pistols at the time of the hijacking—but at Kabul they also had submachine guns." Dyess cited eyewitness reports to the effect that in Kabul "all three hijackers stood [on the tarmac] in view of Afghan and Soviet security personnel, without any apparent concern for their own safety." Passenger Hubbell's wife Charlotte said that the hijackers boasted of having been trained by the Palestine Liberation Organization. The P.L.O. connection seemed intriguing, since the organization has ties to three countries that, in one way or another, were involved in the hijacking episode: the Soviet Union, Syria and Libya.

Ironically, the hijacking may ultimately prove beneficial to the man against whom it was mounted: Zia. For one thing, the hijackers' professed allegiance to Bhuttoist sedition gave Zia a strong excuse to crack down even harder on his P.P.P. opponents at home. Second, the incident turned out to be an embarrassment to the Soviets, who have been seeking to destabilize Zia's regime because of his opposition to their Afghanistan invasion. Finally, the hostages-for-prisoners exchange allowed Zia to assume something of a humanitarian guise while evicting 54 dangerous political enemies. As he put it last week, Pakistan had rid itself of "some bad eggs." Perhaps. The rest of the world could only hope that Zia's troubled country had not also exported the seeds of more terrorism. —By Thomas A. Sancton. Reported by Mohammed Aftab/Islamabad and William Stewart/Damascus