One of the hostages held captive on the Indian aircraft grounded in Afghanistan is an Irish citizen, the Department of Foreign Affairs has confirmed.
Meanwhile as the hijack entered its seventh day, the hijackers dropped some of their demands and are no longer insisting on a $200 million ransom.
The hostage, who was born and raised in Australia holds both Irish and Australian passports. It is thought he was travelling on his Australian passport when he boarded the Indian Airlines flight in Nepal last Friday. The Sydney Morning Herald named him as Mr Peter Ward (36), a banker.
A spokesman for the Department of Foreign Affairs said last night that he was aware that one of the passengers on the hijacked aircraft holds an Irish passport.
He said because the man had been travelling on his Australian passport, he would have Australian consular protection and the Department had contacted the Australian authorities.
The hijackers are also said to have abandoned their request for the exhumation of the body of a Kashmiri separatist. The hijackers' demand for the release of 35 Kashmiri separatists from Indian jails still stands, as does their original demand for the release of a Muslim cleric, Maulana Masood Azhar, jailed in Jammu, winter capital of the state of Jammu and Kashmir.
Meanwhile three Kashmiri separatist leaders, jailed in the same prison, condemned the hijacking saying: "The act is unIslamic and that too in the month of holy Ramadan when Muslims pray for the peace of the whole world."