Italy to seek extradition of Abul Abbas

Italy will seek the extradition of Abul Abbas, the Palestinian terror leader captured by US commandos in a raid near Baghdad last night, the justice minister said today.

Abbas’s Palestinian Liberation Front killed an American on the hijacked Italian cruise liner Achille Lauro in 1985.

Abbas, 55, was convicted in absentia in an Italian court for the Achille Lauro hijacking and sentenced to life in prison in 1986.

Justice Minister Roberto Castelli said that Italy had sought his extradition in recent months from Egypt and Jordan, where Italian intelligence information said he might be.

“Now we know he has been captured in Iraq, but that he’s in the hands of American authorities. We will have to clarify some legal questions as to whom to request the extradition, which we’ll do as soon as possible,” he said.

The minister’s spokesman, Lorenzo Colombo, said later “If the competent authority is the United States, we will ask the United States.”

American officials would not say whether Abbas would be held inside Iraq, taken to a third country or detained at a US base. They also would not say whether he would face charges in the United States.

No matter where they take Abbas, his American captors are sure to grill him about his ties to other terrorists and Saddam Hussein, who sheltered Abbas for years.

Abbas, whose real name is Mohammed Abbas, garnered international attention when the liner Achille Lauro was seized off Egypt, by members of his PLO splinter group.

Hundreds of passengers, including American Leon Klinghoffer and his wife, were taken hostage. The hijackers demanded that Israel release 50 imprisoned Palestinians.

They shot Klinghoffer in his wheelchair and tossed him overboard.

The other passengers were released after a two-day ordeal and the commandos surrendered to Egyptian authorities, who put them on a flight to the PLO’s headquarters in Tunisia.

US Navy jets forced the flight down in Sicily. The Italians, to the Americans’ dismay, allowed Abbas to flee to Yugoslavia before an American warrant for piracy and hostage-taking could be served.

Abbas disappeared, and international manhunts and a price on his head failed to flush him out. His faction relocated to Iraq after the attack.

Abbas repeatedly apologised for the murder, saying his fighters had meant to attack Israel and only seized the ship after its crew discovered the terrorists’ weapons.

“The killing of the passenger was a mistake. ... We are sorry,” he said.

He had twice tried to flee to Syria as US forces advanced through Iraq, but was turned away, Palestinian officials said today.

They said he tried to flee west to Syria without informing Syrian authorities after the fall of Baghdad to coalition forces last week. He travelled from Baghdad to the northern city of Mosul and then to the Syrian border but was recognised at the border and was turned back by Syrian officials.

Several days ago, Abbas again went to Mosul and on to the Syrian border to try to leave Iraq after Palestinian guerrilla factions based in Damascus tried to intercede with the Syrian government on his behalf.

He was again turned away. He returned to Baghdad, where he has been living for most of the last 18 years. The next day he was captured, the officials said from south Lebanon.

Abbas was also attempting through other channels to get into Iran, Iraq’s eastern neighbour, said the officials.

In recent days, Syria has come under enormous pressure from the United States, which has accused it of sheltering fugitives from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s collapsed regime, possessing chemical weapons and supporting terrorism. The charges were denied by Damascus.

Abbas’ wife, Reem, said in Lebanon she was “surprised” at her husband’s detention and cited an amnesty deal between the United States and the PLO, of which he was once a member.