The tasks of the Director General of National Security in Algeria, Farid Ben Cheikh, have been terminated, and Ali Bedawi has been appointed as his successor due to an incident involving a young man who infiltrated a plane at Oran Airport and arrived in France clinging to its wheels. The Algerian news agency reported today, Monday, that the Minister of Interior and Local Communities, Ibrahim Mourad, presided over the official inauguration of the new Director General of National Security, Ali Bedawi, in Algiers without providing additional details regarding the reasons for the dismissal.
On Sunday, the investigating judge at the Court of Al-Othmania in the Oran Court of Appeals issued orders for the provisional detention of ten police officers working at Ahmed Ben Bella International Airport in Oran, following the incident in which an individual infiltrated the wheel system chamber of a plane belonging to Air Algerie during its flight to Orly Airport in Paris on December 28, 2023.
A statement issued by the Public Prosecutor's Office at the Al-Othmania Court indicated that an investigation had been opened against ten police officers at the airport and a mechanic from Air Algerie for committing an unintentional act that endangered the lives of those on board the aircraft and exposed others to direct physical danger and compromising aircraft security.
Algerian presidency announced on January 4 that President Abdelmadjid Tebboune ordered the Director General of Internal Security to conduct a thorough preliminary investigation into the incident involving the young man "Rahmani Mahdi," who aimed for illegal immigration through an Air Algerie flight at Oran International Airport at 8:05 AM on December 28, 2023, where he was caught.
Additionally, the investigations initiated by the General Directorate of Internal Security on site revealed direct responsibility for seven employees of the National Security Directorate, specifically from border police, along with the head of the second border police unit at Oran Airport and the police chief responsible for airport security.
The investigations also exposed the direct responsibility of a mechanic from Air Algerie, extending administrative accountability to the technical director of Air Algerie, the director of Oran Airport, and the regional director of the National Airports Management Company in Oran.
Previously, French media reported that workers at Orly Airport, near Paris, discovered a young man in his twenties hiding in the landing gear of a plane arriving from Oran, Algeria, during a routine technical inspection. The worker found the individual near the landing wheels where he was hiding, prompting intensified investigations, which revealed that the young man was alive but suffered from severe hypothermia after arriving on an Air Algerie flight.
