Saudi national nabbed for security breach at NAIA

A 19-year-old Saudi Arabian was arrested after posing as a pilot and breaching security measures at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA), an airport official said Tuesday. Hani Bokhary was nabbed by security officials about 5 p.m. Monday at the Immigration Area of the NAIA Terminal 1, according to Manila International Airport Authority general manager Alfonso Cusi. “He was wearing a pilot’s uniform and he had been loitering the airport for hours. When the personnel at the crew lane at the Immigration Area asked for his ID, he could not present any," Cusi told GMANews.TV in a phone interview. Bokhary, who arrived in Manila last November 30 for a visit, is set to be transferred Tuesday night to a detention facility in Camp Bagong Diwa in Taguig City, Cusi said. Cusi quoted Bokhary as saying that he was just waiting for his father who is set to arrive from a Saudi Arabian airline at 6 p.m. Monday. “But he could not explain why he had to wear a pilot’s uniform," Cusi said. The general manager likewise admitted there had been “security lapses" in NAIA-1 in connection with the incident. He, however, did not say whether airport security officials would be sanctioned for the breach. Cusi also said they do not see the incident as a terrorism threat. “Wala namang ganung terrorism, whatsoever." The NAIA is on alert following the December 25 botched terror attack in a Detroit-bound plane from Amsterdam. Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab supposedly tried to blow up the Northwest 253 flight on the orders of the Al-Qaeda terrorist network. - Sophia Dedace/KBK, GMANews.TV