China-bound flight diverted to Uzbekistan and 118 passengers evacuated after call claiming there was a bomb on board

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

An EgyptAir passenger plane en route from Cairo to Beijing has been forced to make an emergency landing in Uzbekistan after receiving a security threat that the airline said turned out to be a hoax.

All 118 passengers and 17 crew members on board the Airbus plane were evacuated in Urgench, western Uzbekistan, on Wednesday after the threat was made three hours into the flight, EgyptAir said.

The plane and passengers were searched by Uzbek authorities who confirmed that the threat was a hoax.

“The necessary actions are under way to resume the journey to Beijing airport,” the airline’s statement said.

An EgyptAir flight crashed into the Mediterranean last month, killing all 66 people on board. An investigation to determine why and exactly where it crashed continues.

EgyptAir has received a number of bomb threats since the crash, all of which have turned out to be hoaxes.

An EgyptAir official, who asked not to be named because he is not authorised to speak to the media, said the hoaxes had caused numerous delays and cost the company a lot of money.

“It is a conspiracy against EgyptAir,” he said. “It is very costly.”

Last month’s crash was the third major aviation incident for Egypt since a Russian plane was brought down by a bomb in late October. In March, a man wearing a fake suicide belt hijacked an EgyptAir plane and diverted it to Cyprus.

Wednesday’s false security threat, which was unusual in that it was made after the plane had taken off, could add to a climate of uncertainty that has already put off visitors.

The number of tourists visiting Egypt fell 54% in April 2016 compared with a year earlier as the country has struggled to restore confidence and lure visitors back to its sandy beaches and pharaonic relics.

Egypt’s tourism industry, a cornerstone of the economy and a critical source of hard currency, has been struggling since the 2011 uprising that ended Hosni Mubarak’s 30-year rule and ushered in a period of political and economic upheaval.

Egyptian forces are also battling to end an Islamist insurgency in the Sinai peninsula, where the Russian plane crashed. Islamic State claimed responsibility for that attack.