ISLAMABAD: Air traffic at Hamburg Airport remained grounded on Sunday due to an ongoing hostage situation on the tarmac involving a father and his four-year-old daughter, according to German authorities.
The man, a 35-year-old Turk, expressed his desire to board a plane to Turkey with his child. Negotiations were still in progress nearly 15 hours after the incident began. The ordeal started when a gunman drove his car through the security area onto the apron where planes are parked on Saturday evening. He fired two shots into the air and threw two Molotov cocktails out of the vehicle.
The driver barricaded himself and the child inside his car near a Turkish Airlines plane. Police believe the child is physically unharmed based on a telephone conversation with the man. However, the child’s mental state was not disclosed by the police.
Efforts to resolve the situation peacefully were ongoing, with authorities attributing the incident to a custody dispute between the father and his wife, who had alerted the police about the child’s abduction.
A significant number of emergency services were present on the scene, and communication between the father and authorities was seen as a positive sign. As of Sunday morning, air traffic remained suspended, and the airport management updated that the police operation was still ongoing. On Saturday evening, 17 incoming flights were diverted, and 286 flights scheduled for Sunday carrying approximately 34,500 passengers were affected by the situation.
Blinken’s Surprise Visit To West Bank, Meets Palestinian Authority President
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken made an unannounced visit to the occupied West Bank on Sunday.
He met with the Palestinian Authority president as part of his ongoing tour of the region, which comes amid escalating tensions over Israel’s war with Hamas.
Blinken and Mahmoud Abbas met in the West Bank city of Ramallah, the de facto Palestinian capital. This marked Blinken’s second visit to the region since the October 7th attacks.
