Polish plane makes emergency landing in Prague after threat

Prague: A Boeing 707 operated by a Polish charter airline made an emergency landing in Prague after a bomb threat by a passenger who was then detained by police, Czech officials said.

"A man who threatened to detonate a booby trap... Is in the hands of the Czech police," Interior Minister Milan Chovanec told the Czech public television yesterday.

"The man was Polish, just like most passengers," he added but declined to say whether the police had actually found a bomb.

Richard Klima, spokesman for Prague's air traffic controllers, told AFP that the Enter Air plane flying from Las Palmas, Spain to Warsaw landed in Prague following the pilot's request.

Chovanec said about 160 passengers were evacuated from the plane that had landed at a disused old airport next to Prague's Vaclav Havel Airport, and that the situation was safe.

He added the passengers would stay the night in Prague pending a thorough check of the plane which could finally leave for Warsaw yesterday morning.