Two airplane hijackers were repatriated back to the Chinese mainland from Taiwan on Tuesday.

Yang Mingde and Lin Wenqiang, who hijacked a passenger plane together from the mainland to Taiwan in 1993, were handed over to authorities at 11:40 AM on Tuesday on Mazu Island, off the east coast of Fujian Province. Officers from Shandong Provincial Public Security Bureau took them into custody.

The two hijackers arrived by ship to Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian, at around 1 PM under police escort. They would fly to Shandong later.

No further details are available to date from the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council.

The repatriation was made in accordance with the Jinmen Agreement, signed in 1990 between Red Cross organizations on both sides of the Taiwan Straight. The agreement covers suspect and criminal repatriation procedures.

(Xinhua News Agency August 14, 2007)