Brindisi, Italy – Italian officials said Wednesday that they intend to prosecute a Turkish man for hijacking an airliner despite his appeal for political asylum on grounds that he is being persecuted as a Christian in Muslim Turkey.
The Turkish Airlines Boeing 737-400 with 113 people aboard was hijacked Tuesday during a flight from Tirana, Albania, to Istanbul, Turkey. It landed in the Adriatic port city of Brindisi in southern Italy after Italian air force fighter jets escorted the aircraft there.
Brindisi prosecutor Giuseppe Giannuzzi, who interrogated hijacker Hakan Ekinci after he surrendered, said his office may also charge him with terrorism.
“The charge he is accused of is hijacking, and I’m working to see if we can qualify this as terrorism,” Giannuzzi told a news conference in Brindisi.
Turkish police identified Ekinci as a 28-year-old army deserter who fled to Albania in May and had asked for political asylum there. He was going back to Turkey on Tuesday, where Turkish authorities said police planned to arrest him.
Turkey’s Ambassador to Italy, Ugur Ziyal, dismissed claims that Ekinci was afraid of being persecuted.
“This issue is a comedy of misrepresentation,” Ziyal said. “Whatever (Ekinci) is saying has nothing to do with reality.”
