Ukraine's evacuation flight in Afghanistan hijacked: Report

Armed men hijacked a Ukrainian plane and flew it to Iran after it arrived in Afghanistan last week to evacuate Ukrainians, media reports said.

“Last Sunday, our plane was hijacked by other people. On Tuesday, the plane was practically stolen from us, with an unidentified group of passengers onboard instead of airlifting Ukrainians,” Ukraine’s Deputy Foreign Minister Yevgeny Yenin told Russian News Agency TASS.

“Our next three evacuation attempts were also not successful because our people could not get into the airport,” Yenin said.

The deputy minister did not report anything about what happened to the plane or whether Kiev would seek to get it back or how the Ukrainian citizens got back from Kabul.

The Deputy Foreign Minister said the hijackers were armed, but failed to give any details about what happened to the plane or what will Kiev do to get it back or how the Ukrainian citizens got back from Kabul.

Meanwhile, Iran refuted claims that it was behind the alleged hijack. “Apparently it happened yesterday at 22:00 local/1730Z, the aircraft landed in Mashhad for “refueling” and immediately embarked for Kyiv afterward… We deny the Ukrainian claims,” Iranian Civil Aviation Organization spokesperson Mohammad Hassan Zibakhsh said.

BBC’s Ukrain correspondent, Jonah Fisher tweeted saying Kyiv has denied reports of hijack.
Fisher tweeted: “Ukraine says there is no “hijacking” of one it’s planes evacuating Kabul.
It seems the deputy FM spoke loosely about something from early last week – my hunch being that there was a private Ukrainian owned plane in Kabul – that fleeing Afghans used their “muscle” to commandeer.”

Ukraine says there is no “hijacking” of one it’s planes evacuating Kabul.
It seems the deputy FM spoke loosely about something from early last week – my hunch being that there was a private Ukrainian owned plane in Kabul – that fleeing Afghans used their “muscle” to commandeer.

— Jonah Fisher (@JonahFisherBBC) August 24, 2021

As reported by TASS, the Ukranian plane was a military transport with 83 people onboard, including 31 Ukrainians.