Heading into the New Year's holiday with terror threats high, government officials said on Monday they will require selected international flights that cross into US airspace to carry an armed law-enforcement officer aboard to stave off any attempt to hijack the plane.
The Homeland Security Department will require such officers on flights where intelligence information leads to a specific concern about that airplane, department spokesman Dennis Murphy said.
"We will then notify the carrier that, based on information we received, we require a law enforcement officer to be on the plane,"Murphy said.
The directive announced on Monday says that armed government officers from the country of the airline's ownership must be aboard, and says they must be equipped to prevent anyone from reaching the plane's cockpit and must be equipped to communicate with the crew, Murphy said.
For months, US security officials have feared that al-Qaeda operatives will again hijack planes to use them as missiles. The most recent concerns center not on domestic passenger flights, but on airliners or cargo planes that take off from overseas and cross over US airspace, either on their way to a US airport or to a foreign one.
The Bush administration raised the terrorism alert level to orange, or high, on Dec. 21 and Air France canceled six flights between Paris and Los Angeles on Wednesday and Thursday last week, after security discussions between US and French officials.
Murphy said US officials provided information to France about some of the passengers on the flights, prompting French officials to order their cancellation. Murphy said he was uncertain whether the US government sought the cancellation of those flights.
Homeland Security reviews the passenger and crew manifests of all planes bound for US airspace, generally after the plane has taken off, because passenger lists are usually finalized only minutes before the plane taxis from the gate, Murphy said. Some passenger lists are reviewed beforehand, he said.
Homeland Security officials said the new directive, which is effective immediately, will further enhance security on commercial and cargo aircraft flying to, from and over the US.
"We are asking international air carriers to take this protective action as part of our ongoing effort to make air travel safe for Americans and visitors alike," Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said in a statement.
"I have said that we will take specific steps to increase security whenever necessary, and with this action we are doing just that," he added.
The directive comes in the form of three emergency amendments to air-security regulations involving cargo planes, passenger planes and airliners passing over US airspace. Any plane not complying with a request for a security presence could be denied access to US airspace.
A State Department spokesman said on Monday that foreign countries have been receptive to the new US directive.
Britain said on Sunday it had tightened security for trans-Atlantic flights and suggested it might put armed sky marshals on some planes. The US already places armed security officers on certain flights.
"The last few days have seen the United States increase their general threat and security levels, and what we are proposing is a proportionate and appropriate level of response at a time when the threat to both our countries and around the world remains real and serious," said Britain's top law enforcement official, David Blunkett.
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