Times of Malta reported that the Maltese police on Friday deported a Libyan national convicted of hijacking an Afriqiyah Airways plane in 2016.
The newspaper added that the Libyan citizen served a prison sentence in Malta for 8 years after being convicted of kidnapping and terrorism and remained detained because he did not cooperate with the police, saying that he would not be allowed to enter Malta or any other country in the European Union.
It indicated that the plane was hijacked in December 2016 by Libyan citizens with 120 passengers on board, using fake weapons, when it was on a domestic flight from Sabha to Tripoli before diverting its course to Malta.
In December 2016, an Afriqiyah Airways A320 aircraft was hijacked in Libyan airspace by two people claiming to be from a pro-Gaddafi group.
The plane was on a domestic flight from Sabha to Tripoli when the two diverted its course. Although they threatened to blow up the plane, it later turned out that they used fake weapons.