Xinjiang hit the aviation headlines again in June
2012...for all the wrong reasons. A Tianjin Airlines flight was the subject of an attempted hijacking. However, the outcome was positive inasmuch as the passengers and crew managed to overpower the six hijackers and land safely. Against this backdrop, Xiaoyong Yang reveals some of the programmes and legislation in place to ensure in-flight security in Chinese skies
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he attempted aircraft hijacking that took place in the skies over Xinjiang on 29th June this year has again drawn the attention of the Chinese civil aviation authorities to the issue of in-flight security. Acts of unlawful interference against civil aviation in China have generally been safely resolved and have not had the same global media coverage that has been generated by the terrorist spectaculars in the West. Regional experts have spoken highly of the Chinese aviation security environment yet the latest incident, regardless of the impact on the media, is a pertinent reminder that the threat of terrorism is truly global. The reality of an incident occurring does not indicate any relaxation in the efforts of the professionals engaged in
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aviation security in China; their vigilance has never faltered. Since the 11th September 2001 attacks in the United States, the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has taken a series of in-flight security measures to prevent and respond to the various threats to the civil aviation system.
China’s Prediction and Response to 11th September 2001
At the turn of the new millennium, the Chinese government made a careful evaluation of the aviation industry’s security vulnerabilities and a National Leading Group in the Resolution of Hijackings was set up in March 2001. The group, headed by the Vice Premier of the State Council, is the Chinese Government’s command centre for the resolution of hijackings. It integrates the resources of
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the Civil Aviation Administration, Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of State Security, Ministry of Health, General Headquarters of the Armed Police Force, PLA General Staff Department and the Air Force. 1
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establishment of the group pre-9/11 demonstrated sound judgment by the CAAC. Indeed, early in September 2001, at a routine CAAC aviation security work group, experts pointed out that, with the development of international terrorism, the original simple hijacking may no longer satisfy the needs of the latest terrorist groups and that the possibility existed of an aircraft being intentionally crashed. The group’s participants did not anticipate that their expert analysis would become a reality so soon and that, only a few days later, would actually occur in the United States.
August 2012 Aviationsecurityinternational
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