Mehmet Goksin Gol, 40, who has previous convictions for drug offenses, threatened to blow up a Boeing 737-800 belonging to the Turkish airline Pegasus, en route from Diyarbakir to Istanbul with 178 passengers and six crewmembers on board.
Following his detention at Ankara's Esenboga airport, where the plane was forced to land, police discovered that Gol did not actually have any explosives on him.
There is no official information regarding Gol's motive for the hijacking, but according to some reports he demanded that the pilot fly him to Iran.
In line with the Criminal Code of Turkey, Gol faces up to 10 years in maximum security prison for hijacking the plane.
The hijacking is the second involving a Turkish plane in six months. Last October, a Turkish hijacker seeking political asylum took over a Turkish airliner over Greek airspace and demanded to be flown to Italy.
