The New York Times · 14 November 1985

CP-1985-030

Palestinians Go on Trial Monday In Genoa on Charges in Hijacking

By JOHN TAGLIABUE

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Transcribed from the clipping

GENOA, Italy, Nov. 13 — Five Palestinians will go on trial here Monday in connection with the hijacking last month of the cruise ship Achille Lauro, magistrates announced today. The men will face charges of owning and illegally importing to Italy the guns and explosives they are said to have later used to seize the ship.

A separate investigation is under way into the hijacking of the ship and the slaying of an elderly American passenger, Leon Klinghoffer of New York. A date for a second trial on those charges is to be announced later. Under Italian law, charges involving illegal possession and use of firearms and explosives can be separated from a larger bundle of charges and heard separately.

Four of the men are charged with being the hijackers. They were seized the night of Oct. 10 when an Egyptian airliner carrying them from Cairo was forced by American warplanes to land at a military air base on Sicily. The fifth man, arrested by the Italian police in September on charges of carrying false passports, was later implicated in preparations for the hijacking.

The four suspected hijackers were identified as Magied Youssef al-Molqi, 23 years old, who was born in Jordan; Ahmad Marrouf al-Assadi, 23, born in Damascus, Syria; Ibrahim Fatayer Abdelatif, 20, born in Beirut, Lebanon; and Bassam al-Ashker, 19, born in Tripoli, Lebanon. The fifth man was identified tentatively as Mohamed Kalaf, 25, born in Damascus, Syria. Mr.

Kalaf had previously been identified as Mohammed Zainab. In addition, the prosecutors made public new details about the hijacking and preparations for it that they said had emerged from their investigations. If convicted on the weapons charges, he said, the men could face jail sentences of 3 to 12 years and fines.

The hearing will be conducted before a panel of three judges in a special high-security courthouse here. It is expected to last only one day.

Luigi Carli, the prosecutor in the scheduled trial, said he would summon eight witnesses, all Italians, and present other evidence, including photographs of the weapons said to have been used — four Soviet-designed Kalashnikov automatic rifles, eight hand grenades and nine detonators.

The magistrates said they could not give a starting date for the principal trial, in which the defendants would be tried for the events directly related to the hijacking and the slaying of Mr. Klinghoffer.

Two days ago, the magistrates let it be known that they had issued nine more arrest orders for suspects in the hijacking case, bringing to 16 the total number of warrants issued to date. One of those orders was for Mohammed Abbas, the Palestine Liberation Organization official whom Washington has claimed was the mastermind of the hijacking operation.

Seven men, including the five to stand trial next week, are in Italian custody. The others are at large.

In recent days, justice officials here have said that testimony by the men in custody and other evidence seemed to indicate that preparations for the hijacking may have begun as long ago as 10 months, and that they involved scouting the cruise ship and reconnoitering its crew by Mr. Molqi and another Palestinian, who used the name Petros Floros and is still at large.

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