Talks with a group of about six hijackers demanding the release of a rebel Afghan leader, Ismail Khan, were described by police last night as "fairly calm and business-like".
But the Afghan government, run by the hardline Taliban movement, stated unequivocably yesterday it would not consider any deal and said they expected the British government to deal forcibly with the terrorists.
British officials made it clear that they hoped the quiet negotiation, which has worked in previous hijack situations at Stansted, would prove successful again.
Tony Blair, who was woken at about 1am to be informed that the hijacked plane was on its way to the Essex airport, has to re-establish the credibility of the international community's policy of no-deals with hijackers. The policy was severely undermined by the Indian government's decision to give way by releasing prisoners in a similar hijack six weeks ago.
The plane, belonging to the Ariana airline, has been under the control of the hijackers since 5.30GMT on Sunday morning. They took control of a flight from the Afghan capital, Kabul, which was supposed to land at the remote northern town of Mazar-e-Sharif 40 minutes later.
Instead, the plane was diverted by the hijackers, going on an odyssey that included Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Russia before arriving at Stansted at 2.01am yesterday.
The duty foreign office minister, John Battle, gave consentfor the plane to land at Stansted, the designated Lon don airport for hijack incidents. The hijackers are believed to have first asked to go to Heathrow.
During the day, they released three men, three women and two children. Armed police and troops, almost certainly including an SAS team, remained on standby as the plane sat on the south side of airfield last night. Police refused to say what demands, if any, the hijackers were making but said negotiations were being conducted in English. The hijackers are believed to have released nine hostages in Moscow and 10 in Tashkent.
At about 11.50am yesterday two men, both aged 26, a 17-year-old woman and two young children were released and taken to an Essex police station. The children, the woman and one of the men were from the same family.
Three hours later a man and two women were released at the same time as hot food and soft drinks were taken on board. When the plane landed there were 122 men, 20 women and 23 children on board, including 14 crew and the hijackers. Aviation officials said 35 of those belonged to a family heading for a wedding in the north of Afghanistan.
Earlier, at about 6.30am, a generator had been handed over to the hijackers to allow the plane to be air-conditioned. Tea bags, toilet rolls and baby food was also handed over. Negotiations continued on into the evening, with requests for fresh water and for the toilets on the plane to be cleaned.
At midday assistant chief constable John Broughton said they were entering "a critical stage of negotiations". But the stand-off continued into the evening. Three specially trained negotiators were believed to be conducting talks with the hijackers.
The Essex police officers were under the overall control of the chief constable, David Stevens, but police were reluctant to give away too much information about the talks.
The incident, the third major hijack situation at Stansted since 1982, severely disrupted flights.
Ryanair, the major carrier out of Stansted, cancelled all its early flights. The British Airports Authority closed part of the runway, making it impossible for larger planes to take off. But the airport was back to about 90% capacity by early evening.
The Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar, issued a statement read by the movement's ambassador to Pakistan in Islamabad saying it would not negotiate with the hijackers. Describing the hijackers as terrorists, Omar said: "We will not negotiate with them. We will not accept their demands."
Officials at Stansted said they believed the recent hijack in India, which ended in Afghanistan with the hijackers escaping and some of their demands being met, may have encouraged similar actions.
But the Indian minister for information, Shri Arun Jaitley, defended the decision: "One difference is that the last hijack was in a place where commando action was ruled out. While commando action is ruled out, you have to settle."
