The leader of a 1986 hijacking of a Pan Am jet in Pakistan that killed at least 20 people pleaded guilty on Tuesday in a deal with prosecutors that spares him the death penalty but calls for life imprisonment.

Zayd Hassan Abd Al-Latif Masud Al Safarini, 41, a Jordanian, admitted his guilt to all 95 counts of murder, air piracy, hostage taking and other charges for his role in the hijacking at Karachi Airport.

Safarini acknowledged he and three other hijackers committed the crimes as members of the Abu Nidal organization, which the United States includes on its list of foreign terrorist groups.

Asked by the judge why he entered the plea, Safarini, speaking through an interpreter and wearing an orange prison jump suit, replied, "Because I consider myself to be guilty."

He admitted he led the hijackers who took over Pan Am Flight 73 on September 5, 1986 while it was loading for a flight to Frankfurt en route to New York. The flight originated in Bombay.

There were 379 people on board the aircraft at the time of the hijacking, including 78 US citizens, prosecutors said. At least 20 people were killed, including two Americans and citizens of Pakistan, India and Mexico.

Safarini admitted under oath to a detailed factual account of the hijacking read in court by Assistant US Attorney Gregg Maisel.

The hijackers, dressed as security guards and armed with assault rifles, hand grenades and plastic explosives, stormed the plane and demanded a flight crew to take them to Cyprus to secure the release of Palestinian prisoners, Maisel said.

Threatening to kill the passengers and crew one by one until the demands were met, Safarini shot a 29-year-old California man in the head and threw his body from the aircraft to the tarmac, Maisel said.

Sixteen hours later, the hijackers herded the passengers into the center of the plane and opened fire and detonated grenades, Maisel said.

US District Judge Emmet Sullivan ruled in April the death penalty could not be applied in this case, a decision prosecutors had asked him to reconsider.

Prosecutors and defense lawyers then negotiated the plea agreement under which the government will no longer seek the death penalty. It instead provides for a sentence of life in prison.

"The bottom line is you will be forever incarcerated," Sullivan told Safarini. The judge set sentencing for May 10 and will decide then whether to accept the terms of the plea deal, including the agreed-upon sentence.

All four hijackers, and a fifth person who planned the attack, were convicted in Pakistan. Safarini served 15 years in prison before he was released by Pakistani authorities.

He then was apprehended by US law enforcement officers and brought to the United States in late September, 2001, to face charges in the US because Americans were among the victims of the hijack.

(Reuters)