A Jordanian released by Pakistan in September after serving a prison term for hijacking a US plane in 1986 has been transfered to the United States in unclear circumstances to be retried on the same charges in violation of international law, a human rights group said Sunday.
Zeid Abdel Latif Safarini was sentenced to 15 years in jail by the Pakistani authorities after being tried and convicted of hijacking a US airliner at Karachi airport in 1986.
Safarini, a member of the extremist Palestinian Fatah Revolutionary Council of Abu Nidal, served his entire sentence in Pakistan and was released following the September 11 terror attacks on the United States.
Instead of walking free and catching a plane back home to Amman, Safarini was diverted to another flight and flown to the United States where he was arrested and jailed, the Jordanian Association of Human Rights told AFP by phone.
Safarini was due to catch a Karachi-Amman flight on September 29, but instead the Pakistani authorities placed him on a Lahore-Bangkok-Amman flight, the association's president Fawzi Samhuri said.
Safarini never made it to Amman and there was no trace of him until recently when his family in Jordan received a call from a lawyer in the United States, where he was said to be under arrest.
"The United Sates wanted his extradition from Islamabad in order to retry him in America although this violates international law because he has already served his initial sentence," Samhuri told AFP.
Samhuri, quoting the US lawyer, said that Safarini has been charged with "terrorism" over the 1986 plane hijacking in Karachi and was now expected to re-stand trial.
"We have sent a letter to the Pakistani ministry of foreign affairs demanding explanations over the conditions in which Safarini was transferred to the United States," Samhuri said.
"All indications so far show that Safarini's transfer to the US was a coordinated move between Islamabad and Washington," he added – Amman (AFP)
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