Looks likes it.

Yahoo! News:

State-run radio says a commercial airliner has been hijacked in Greek airspace, and a Turkish Airlines spokesman says the aircraft has landed at an airport in Brindisi, Italy.

Private Turkish television NTV, quoting unidentified security officials, says the plane hijacked to protest the pope’s visit to Turkey.

FoxNews.com/AP:

A Turkish Airlines plane carrying 107 passengers from Tirana, Albania to Istanbul, Turkey, was hijacked Tuesday and landed at Italy’s Brindisi airport, a company spokesman said.

The plane was hijacked in Greek airspace, said the spokesman, Ali Genc.

Private Turkish television NTV says plane was hijacked by two Turks.

UPDATE: Not PopeRage-inspired, after all…

Turkish officials said the suspect, whom they identified as Hakan Ekinci, 28, was an army deserter seeking political asylum. They stressed that earlier statements by some officials that he had hijacked the plane to protest Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to Turkey next month were incorrect.

“From the onset of the events, there was no verified information that the hijacking was related to the pope visit,” Turkish Transport Minister Binali Yildirim told The Associated Press. “It was a simple attempt of seeking political asylum under the influence of psychological problems.”

Yildirim said the hijacker was trying to evade military service in Turkey. Istanbul Gov. Muammer Guler also said the hijacker was an army deserter who had fled to Albania, where the hijacked flight originated.

Candan Karlitekin, chairman of Turkish Airlines’ board of directors, initially said the Boeing 737-400 had been hijacked by two Turks. But several officials later said that Ekinci acted alone…

…”I am Hakan Ekinci, I am a Christian and I never want to serve in a Muslim army,” he was quoted as saying in a letter to the pope, according to Dogan, which said it had obtained the letter on a blog posted on the Internet. “I am begging you for help as the spiritual leader of us, Christians’ world.”

“I have been a churchgoer since 1998, I found the true path in Jesus and in the Bible,” Ekinci reportedly wrote.

comments (0)   trackbacks (6)