UK govt, BA face claim over Kuwait hostage crisis

UK govt, BA face claim over Kuwait hostage crisis

LONDON: Passengers and crew members of a British Airways flight who were taken hostage in Kuwait in 1990 are intending to take legal action against the British government and the airline, a law firm said Tuesday. Passengers on BA flight 149 were taken off the Kuala Lumpur-bound plane when it landed in Kuwait on Aug 2 that year, hours after Saddam Hussein’s troops swept in.

Some of the 367 passengers and crew spent more than four months in captivity, including as human shields against Western attacks at the hands of the Iraqi dictator. Representing a group of former BA staff and passengers who were aboard the flight, McCue Jury & Partners said “the victims are taking legal action to ensure the truth is fully disclosed, those responsible are held to account, and due compensation is paid”.

The law firm said that “what the hostages now know is that evidence exists” that the UK government and the airline “knew the invasion had already begun” but allowed the flight to land anyway. And that they did so because “the flight was being used to insert a black ops team of former special forces and security services” into Kuwait, the firm added.

According to the law