Korean Air Flight 858 was a scheduled international passenger flight between Baghdad, Iraq and Seoul, South Korea. On 29 November 1987, the aircraft exploded in mid-air upon the detonation of a bomb planted inside an overhead storage bin in the airplane’s passenger cabin. Everyone aboard the airliner was killed, a total of 104 passengers and 11 crew members. The two bombers were traced to Bahrain, where they both took ampules of cyanide hidden in cigarettes when they realized they were about to be taken into custody. The man died, but the woman, Kim Hyon-hui, survived and later confessed to the bombing. She was sentenced to death after being put on trial for the attack, but was later pardoned by the President of
About Korean Air Flight 858 in brief
Korean Air Flight 858 was a scheduled international passenger flight between Baghdad, Iraq and Seoul, South Korea. On 29 November 1987, the aircraft flying that route exploded in mid-air upon the detonation of a bomb planted inside an overhead storage bin in the airplane’s passenger cabin. Everyone aboard the airliner was killed, a total of 104 passengers and 11 crew members. The attack occurred 34 years after the Korean Armistice Agreement that ended the hostilities of the Korean War on 27 July 1953. The two bombers were traced to Bahrain, where they both took ampules of cyanide hidden in cigarettes when they realized they were about to be taken into custody. The man died, but the woman, Kim Hyon-hui, survived and later confessed to the bombing. She was sentenced to death after being put on trial for the attack, but was later pardoned by the President of South Korea, Roh Tae-woo, because it was deemed that she had been brainwashed in North Korea. Kim now resides in exile, and under constant tight security, fearing that the North Korean government wants to kill her. The United States Department of State has included North Korea on its State Sponsors of Terrorism list, except between 2008 and 2017, since it was included in the list in 2008. The bombing of KAL 858 is still referred to as a ‘terrorist act’ by the U.S. State Department, and is considered to be one of the most serious acts of terrorism in the history of the United States. The bombers’ bodies were buried in South Korea and subsequently sent to Kim Sung-il, the future leader of North Korea, who at that time was the person ultimately responsible for the incident.
The body of the female bomber, 25-year-old Kim Hy onhui was buried in the South and subsequently buried in a plot of land owned by the South Korean government. The female bombers’ passports were identified as forgeries at the airport in Bahrain, and the bombers’ body was sent to South Korea to be buried and subsequently put in a grave in the city of Pyeongchang. The bomber’s body was later buried in Pyeonchang and sent to the South, where it is now buried in an unmarked grave. The woman was later released in a book, The Tears of My Soul, in which she recalled being trained in an espionage school run by the North Korea army, and being told personally by Kim Jong-il to carry out the attack. The pair purchased tickets from Austrian Airlines for flights which would take them from Vienna to Belgrade, Yugoslavia, then on to Baghdad, Abu Dhabi, and finally Bahrain. The next day, they left Belgrade for Saddam International Airport, Baghdad, on an Iraqi Airways flight. On 27 November, two guidance officers who had arrived in Yugoslavia by train from Vienna gave them the time bomb, a Panasonic transistor radio made in Japan, which contained explosives, a detonator, and a bottle of liquid explosive intended to intensify the blast, disguised as a liquor bottle.
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This page is based on the article Korean Air Flight 858 published in Wikipedia (as of Dec. 10, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
