Man who bombed
isle flight held

A Japanese student died
in the 1982 blast

Staff and wire

WASHINGTON -- U.S. law enforcement authorities have apprehended a man convicted of planting a bomb aboard a 1982 flight to Honolulu that killed a Japanese student.

John Russell, a spokesman for the criminal division of the Justice Department, said Mohammed Rashid, a Palestinian national, was appearing in federal court here today.

U.S. officials declined to say how Rashid was captured.

Rashid had been convicted and imprisoned in Greece for the midair explosion aboard Pan American World Airways Flight 830 on Aug. 11, 1982, as the aircraft made its descent to Honolulu following a flight from Tokyo.

Toru Ozawa, a 15-year-old Japanese student, was killed in the bomb blast. Fifteen other Japanese nationals were injured when the bomb went off under Ozawa's seat in the rear of the Boeing 747.

Rashid was freed in 1996 and has been wanted by U.S. authorities since his 1987 indictment in Washington.

Rashid is believed to be linked to the terrorist group Arab 15 May Organization for the Liberation of Palestine, which is regarded by Israeli experts as one of the most deadly terrorists groups worldwide.

U.S. officials say the group has been responsible for other attempts to blow up American and Israeli airliners.

Rashid was arrested in Athens in May 1988 on a tip from U.S. officials and successive American administrations sought his extradition but Greece refused to extradite him.

He was eventually tried in Greece under an international law that allows people charged with terrorist acts against airliners to be tried in the country where they are arrested.

He was convicted by a Greek court in 1992 and sentenced to 18 years imprisonment. An appeals court reduced his sentence to 15 years a year later, and he was freed early in 1996 on grounds of good behavior and flew to Cairo.

U.S. officials criticized the release, arguing that he led a prison uprising in 1994.

Rashid repeatedly denied his identity during his trial, claiming that his real name was Mohammed Hamdan and he was a Palestine Liberation Organization fighter in Beirut at the time of the Pan Am explosion. The PLO helped him with his defense.

A key witness against Rashid was an Iraqi Palestinian named Anad Awad who was in the Justice Department's witness protection program and was flown to Athens to testify.