Seventy two former hostages of the hijacked Afghan airliner left Britain early today bound for Kandahar in Afghanistan. The passengers were returning home on a Kampuchea airlines jet from RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, eight days after their hijack ordeal began.
The group had earlier been taken by coach from a makeshift immigration base in Gloucestershire to the airbase 20 miles away. Some 76 people remain at the temporary centre, where their claims for political asylum were being assessed.
Nineteen men remained in custody, ahead of an expected appearance by an undisclosed number of the group before Southend magistrates today. Essex police said charges against the men, who have been in custody since they gave themselves up at Stansted Airport in the early hours of Thursday, were expected in the next few hours.
It is likely those accused could face charges of hijacking or air piracy, which carries a life sentence, as well as possession of firearms.
The British Home Secretary, Mr Jack Straw, said yesterday that the government and British society as a whole faced a "dilemma" about the fate of the Afghan asylum-seekers who were on board the hijacked aircraft at Stansted Airport last week.
But he said it was an "absurd proposition" to suggest that the government would deliberately send former hostages back to a country where they faced the threat of violence.
In an attempt to clarify the "serious dilemma" he faced, Mr Straw said he did not believe his comments in the Commons - he said he wanted to see all the people from the aircraft removed from Britain as quickly as possible - prejudiced their chances of getting a fair asylum hearing.
He will personally assess the asylum applications, but Mr Straw denied accusations that he had spoken prematurely. "There is nothing I said in the House of Commons which could prejudice the exercise of my discretion and, as well as that, everybody knows that what I do is make the initial decision in asylum cases but there is a right of appeal thereafter," he told BBC's On the Record programme.
Tabloid newspapers in Britain have reported the hijacking with particular venom. The Daily Mail told its readers last Thursday that the hijack was an "awayday to asylum" and that the hijackers had demanded asylum, immunity from prosecution and the right to establish an Afghan political base in London. The Sun complained that one of its reporters was unable to book a room at the £200a-night Hilton Hotel at Stansted because a "bedraggled bunch of Afghan asylum-seekers" had turned the hotel into a refugee camp.
But mindful of the debate the hijack has provoked about Britain's asylum laws and the treatment of hijackers, Mr Straw yesterday appeared to soften his tough line.