Aeroflot Flight 6833

Aeroflot Flight 6833, enroute from Tbilisi, Georgian SSR, to Leningrad, Russian SFSR, with an intermediate stop in Batumi, was a scene of an attempted hijacking by nine young Georgians on November 18-19 1983. The crisis ended with the storm of the airplane by the Soviet special forces and resulted in eight dead. The surviving hijackers were subsequently tried and executed.

Incident

An attempt to hijack a Tu-134 A aircraft of the state-run Aeroflot company was made by nine young people, 6 men and 3 women – all children of Georgian intellectual élite families – with the purpose of fleeing from the Soviet Union on November 18, 1983. Among the hijackers were the painters Gia Tabidze, Davit Mikaberidze, and Soso Tsereteli, the actor Gega Kobakhidze (who had just been selected to play a role in Tengiz Abuladze’s subsequently famous film "Repentance" [Julie Christensen. Tengiz Abuladze's Repentance and the Georgian Nationalist Cause. "Slavic Review", Vol. 50, No. 1 (Spring, 1991), pp. 163-175.] ), and the physicians Paata and Kakhi Iverieli. They pretended to be a wedding party, boarded the airliner in Tbilisi, and tried to divert it to Turkey. There were 57 passengers and seven crewmembers on board. The captain Akhmatger Gardapkhadze and the co-pilot Vladimir Gasoyan offered armed resistance (both of them were subsequently awarded the titles of the Hero of the Soviet Union), and several people were injured in a clash. Rather than concede to the hijackers' demands, the pilot circled Tbilisi and later landed. The Georgian Communist Party chief Eduard Shevardnadze called for the deployment of an élite Soviet special unit Alpha Group from Moscow. On November 19, the Alpha group stormed the aircraft and arrested the surviving hijackers. The incident claimed lives of 3 crewmembers, 2 passengers and 3 hijackers. The aircraft received 108 bullet holes during the attack.ka icon [http://www.pol.ge/archive/jinsebis_taoba.html თვითმფრინავის გამტაცებლები (The Hijackers).] "Archive Administration of Ministry of Internal Affairs". Accessed on April 25 2008.]

Trial and aftermath

The arrested hijackers as well as their friend and confessor Orthodox priest Theodore Chikhladze were tried by the Soviet Georgian court. The convicts declared that they wanted to "have a better life and live in a free society." Shevardnadze described them as "drug addicts" and "bandits", and demanded the death penalty. In August 1984, the three hijackers – Kobakhidze and the brothers Iverieli – were sentenced to death, while their female co-conspirator Tinatin Petriashvili received a 14-year jail sentence. In spite of the lack of evidence, the priest Chikhladze was declared a "ringleader" and also sentenced to death. On October 3 1984, all four men were shot.

Many details of the incident are still unclear and a series of questions remain open. Shevardnadze has been accused of rejecting the offer by the hijackers’ parents to negotiate with their children the release of the hostages. Many claims have been made that he demanded the death penalty for the hijackers to strengthen his positions among the Communist leadership and to show his loyalty to Moscow. The 108 bullet holes in the aircraft as well as the death of a stewardess remain to be a source of controversy. In 2001, a young Georgian producer of the Marjanishvili Theater, Dato Doiashvili, decided to make a performance of the 1983 events. However, the theater administration didn't accept the screenplay of the writer David Turashvili. The latter stated Shevardnadze was reluctant to recall old memories. Georgian human right organizations claimed censorship in Georgia was still functional. The performance "The Jeans Generation" was staged, however, at the private Free Liberty Theatre and gained a conspicuous popularity in Georgia.

References

External links

* [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9A0DE1D81538F935A2575BC0A962948260 Four in Soviet Doomed In Georgian Hijacking] . "The New York Times". August 16, 1984.
* [http://aviation-safety.net/database/record.php?id=19831118-0 18 November 1983: Aeroflot/Georgia.] "Aviation Safety Network".
*ka icon [http://www.pol.ge/archive/jinsebis_taoba.html თვითმფრინავის გამტაცებლები (The Hijackers).] "Archive Administration of Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia" (includes photo and video material)