How Sheikh Mohammed negotiated with flight hijackers

Dubai - "Due to their threats to kill a passenger every 10 minutes, we gave them fuel, and then the plane departed."

In this chapter, Sheikh Mohammed tells the story of a terrorism incident that happened in the UAE and what the experience taught him.
In one of the meetings I headed at the Ministry of Defence, I read news about a Lufthansa Airlines plane, with 91 passengers on board, being hijacked. The plane was flying from Spain to Frankfurt when it was hijacked by members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). They were demanding the release of their partners imprisoned in Western Germany. I knew that they flew to Larnaka and then to Bahrain. I had no doubts that we should be prepared to stand with our brothers in Bahrain if they needed any assistance.
Later, I discovered it was flying to Dubai after refuelling in Bahrain. I gave orders to inform the President and Sheikh Rashid, and then hurried to the airport as the flight between Dubai and Bahrain takes only 60 minutes. I needed more than 60 minutes to prepare the airport, deploy the snipers, soldiers and medical teams, and weaponise vehicles in areas that wouldn't be visually accessible to the hijackers.
After preparing everything, I contacted the plane and gave them the permission to land in the airport. When it landed, one of the hijackers spoke on the plane's microphone. One of his demands was the release of some members of the Red Army Faction, which was a West German far-left militant organisation.
I spoke to an illogical man for 48 hours, about many unrelated things. I knew that any wrong action could result in the death of the passengers, so the best way to deal with them was through negotiations.
Due to their threats to kill a passenger every 10 minutes, we gave them fuel, and then the plane departed.
In Aden, the plane's captain was killed, and the hijackers threw his body on the runway. I was the last person he spoke with. Their demands were met in Aden and they received more fuel.
Then, they flew to Mogadishu in Somalia, and there, a commando team of a German anti-terrorist squad stormed the plane, killed the three hijackers, arrested the fourth, who was a woman, and freed the passengers.
hesham@khaleejtimes.com 
In what he is calling his "incomplete biography", His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, has broken his latest book, Qissati (My Story), into 50 chapters, narrating 50 stories in his 50 years of serving the nation. Khaleej Times got a signed copy of the book from the Dubai Ruler and every day, we will be featuring excerpts from each of the 50 chapters.

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