Seychelles enhances capacity in dealing with aircraft hijacking |04 May 2017

Twenty members of the Seychelles Rapid Intervention Force are receiving training on how to go about in case an aircraft is hijacked.

The five-day training is being held at the Seychelles International Airport led by three experts from the National Gendarmerie Intervention Group (GIGN) including Commander Thierry, Lieutenant Sergio and Lieutenant Jo.

The twenty men taking part in the training are from two units of the Seychelles Police Tactical Response Services and the Seychelles People’s Defence Forces (SDF) Lafors Tazar.

This training, which has also been held in other Indian Ocean countries, kicked off on May 1, 2017 and is expected to end tomorrow.

Yesterday a demonstration was held in the northern parking area of the airport on an Air Seychelles aircraft in the presence of the Police Commissioner Reginald Elizabeth, French ambassador Lionel Majesté-Larrouy, principal secretary for civil aviation, ports & marine Garry Albert, Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority (SCAA's) chief executive (CEO) Gilbert Faure, high officers from SPDF, members of the Seychelles Police and members of SCAA, among other key officers.

Commander Thierry said there has been an increase in terrorism around the world and Seychelles as a nation must be prepared in case a terrorist movement is declared.

“In 2014 a seminar was organised in Reunion to bringing together all the Indian Ocean Countries (IOC) during one week to talk about aircraft hijacking. This is the second part of the training which is taking place in Seychelles. We have done a lot of theoretical and practical training on two planes,” he said.

He said the training is going very well so far and they were lucky to use an airbus A320 and A330 for practical training.

“Training is a continuous process and members of the Seychelles Rapid Intervention Force should never let down their guard as we never know when there might be an attempt to hijack an air plane,” he said.

Compol Elizabeth said this training will benefit all aircraft which land in Seychelles.

He said this training which has been made possible through the cooperation of the French and Seychelles governments, came at an opportune time for us not be taken by surprise if such an incident does occur.

“We’ve seen the theory phase on how they are supposed to approach an aircraft which has been hijacked by pirates and verbal intervention has been established. Then when this is unsuccessful, a military intervention is led to regain control of the aircraft which is on the runway,” he said.

Compol Elizabeth stated that there have been recommendations made for this type of training to be held on a regular basis, at least once a month, and other components associated with air piracy have been identified for further training to increase the effectiveness of the police and army.

He said this demonstration showed the strengths and weaknesses of the team.

“This was an eye-opening exercise where I could identify the challenges so that they can be addressed accordingly,” he said.

As this is a classified training, Compol Elizabeth refused to make any statement which could infringe the progress of the training and with such a sensitive matter the faces of the men are not to be shown either.