'Incident' at Jo'burg International
2004-09-16 23:49
Johannesburg - Two policemen have reportedly been critically wounded during an attempted heist at Johannesburg International Airport on Thursday night.
Police have refused to comment, except to confirm that "an incident" had occurred at the airport.
North Rand police's Eugene Opperman's brief confirmation followed an anonymous call to Sapa.
He said police would later issue a statement.
However, Beeld has learnt that two policemen were wounded just after 21:00 at the KLM cargo bay at the airport.
Radio 702 on Thursday night reported that the shooting was connected to a heist at KLM, where cargo such as diamonds and gold is handled.
There is no indication of what, if anything, has been stolen.
Radio 702 quoted people fetching passengers at the airport as saying several flights had been delayed. This could not be confirmed.
However, the Airports Company of SA's website displayed an "indefinite delay" on the Amsterdam-bound flight KLM KL592-NW8592 scheduled to leave at 22:40.
Thursday night?s "incident" follows a shooting at about 21:30 on Wednesday when a group of men opened fire on police patrolling the perimeter fence of the airport.
The officers had accosted a "suspicious-looking person", whom they asked for identification, said Opperman.
According to an eyewitness a single police officer confronted the man.
At that moment, five men in a blue car of unknown make, parked opposite the gate, told the man to get back to the car.
They opened fire on the policeman with an automatic rifle, wounding him in the chest.
Airport security guards returned fire.
The occupants of the car as well as the man police accosted escaped.
The wounded policeman was taken to a local hospital where he is in a serious, but stable condition.
In December 2001 a gang of men carried out a multi-million
rand armed robbery of US dollars, diamonds and jewellery from a
cargo depot near Johannesburg International.
The gang of between five and eight men held up
three security guards who were inspecting a cargo that had arrived
from Amsterdam earlier.
The men forced the guards to load the cargo onto a one-ton truck.
The robbers got away with R9.5m US dollars, $93 000
worth of diamonds and $8 000 worth of jewellery.
The cash was destined for Angola while the diamonds and
jewellery was for a South African company.