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Ghost Security At OR Tambo International Airport

The Media Review Network(MRN) is seriously concerned that the security services at  O R Tambo International Airport may be at risk of being compromised.

On 22nd April 2017,  Ms. Abeer Zayyad, a visiting archaeologist from Palestine, who at the completion of her South African visit, was on her way back home. She and her brother were booked on an El Al flight to Tel Aviv.

While in the El Al check in queue  at the Airport, they were approached by unidentified plain clothes men. Their passports were confiscated and they were taken in for questioning. Their hosts, the team from Salaamedia, a local media outfit, realised that all was not well and they remained in the public area waiting to hear from their guests. These members of the Salaamedia contingent were also harassed by a senior member who identified himself as “airport security”. He was accompanied by a RAPS security person dressed in brown uniform.

The MRN is disturbed that the harassment of passengers by unidentified “security personnel” continues at one of our key security points. Previously the MRN alerted the authorities of armed foreign “security agents” operating at O R Tambo International Airport. The scandal surrounding the deployment of Israel’s Shin Bet security agents was featured in an expose’ by Carte Blanch in August 2009.

The MRN demands that our Government give the South African public the unadulterated assurance that the security at our key security points in general, and at O R Tambo in particular, is not compromised by outsourcing it to foreign agencies. We believe that in the absence of such an undertaking there may be an urgent need for an independent commission of inquiry to determine the operational activities of foreign agents at O R Tambo International Airport, especially Israelis.

 

Issued by:

Ibrahim Vawda

0722950088

Researcher

Media Review Network

 

 

 

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