A commentary on the case of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, convicted of the murder of 270 people in the Pan Am 103 disaster.
Wednesday, 21 January 2009
Pan Am 103 and UTA 772
The latest post on The Masonic Verses blog concerns the destruction of UTA 772 over Niger on 19 September 1989. Interesting parallels and contrasts are drawn with the destruction of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie.
I would have found the parallels and contrasts between Pan Am 103 and UTA 772 drawn by "The Masonic Verses" blog to be a lot more interesting had they not relied so heavily upon the report by French judge Jean-Louis Bruguière as well as information supplied by the Washington law firm, Crowell Moring.
Bruguière's UTA 772 case against Libya was largely discredited by French investigative journalist Pierre Péan who revealed how the FBI had conspired to incriminate Libya for the sabotage of both Pan Am 103 and UTA 772 (see http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/2001/03/PEAN/14934 "Les preuves trafiquées du terrorisme libyen"). An English translation of the article in "Le Monde Diplomatique" is available at: http://mondediplo.com/2001/03/05libya.
Péan's book was published in March 2001, just after the Pan Am 103 bombing trial had ended with the conviction of Libyan Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi on the strength of just one piece of hard evidence: a tiny fragment of a timing device manufactured by the Swiss firm Mebo.
Two years earlier, six Libyans were tried in absentia and convicted in 1999 by a Paris court for the UTA 772 bombing. Péan claimed there was something wrong: "It is striking to witness the similarity of the discoveries, by the FBI, of the scientific proof of the two aircraft that were sabotaged: the Pan Am Boeing 747 and the UTA DC-10. Among the thousands or rather tens of thousands of pieces of debris collected near the crash sites, just one printed circuit board fragment was found in each case, which carried enough information to allow its identification: Mebo for the Boeing 747 and "TY" (from Taiwan) for the DC-10."
Péan went on to accuse judge Jean-Louis Bruguière of ignoring the results of an analysis by Claude Colisti of the Direction Centrale de la Police Judiciaire (DCPJ) – one of the world's foremost explosives experts – that the "TY" timer fragment had no trace of explosives residue, and could not therefore have been connected to the improvised explosive device that destroyed UTA 772.
Furthermore, neither a forensic inquiry by the Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (DST) nor an examination by the scientific laboratory of the Préfecture de Police (PP) could make any connection between the timer fragment and the bomb. According to Péan, judge Bruguière had therefore taken at face value the word of an FBI political operative - Thomas Thurman - who had been discredited in 1997 by the US Inspector-General, Michael Bromwich, and told never again to appear in court as an expert witness, rather than accept the findings of French forensic experts. It was revealed at the Pan Am 103 bombing trial that the British scientist, Dr Thomas Hayes, had also failed to test the Mebo timer fragment for explosives residue. Such reckless disregard for the integrity of forensic evidence is likely to have the most profound effects upon the Scottish judicial process in relation to Megrahi's second appeal against conviction (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/Lockerbie/Story/0,,2114463,00.html "Libyan jailed over Lockerbie wins right to appeal").
And, finally, it is worth noting that Crowell Moring's civil case against Libya claiming $6 billion in compensation has collapsed as a result of the US-Libya Comprehensive Claims Settlement Agreement, signed in Tripoli on 14 August 2008. One of former President Bush's last acts was to sign (end October 2008) an executive order restoring the Libyan government's immunity from terror-related lawsuits and dismissing all pending compensation cases in the US (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7703110.stm).
So the American law firm still has an axe to grind against Libya.
I too having being studying Lockerbie for many years 17, in my case.
Patrick, without any evidence, dismisses Jean Bruguiere's inquiry into the UTA disaster. I have read all the parts that were put into English by Crowell and Moring as part of the evidence in the Pugh v. Libya compensation claim. It is formidable, the full evidencerunning to some 38 volumes.
Nothing within it gives any support to Patrick's thesis of South Africa or Pean's of Iran.
That in itself is suspicous. Both UTA and Lockerbie Iranian yet attributed to Libya. Occam seems to have lost his razor here!
Pean has written two books on UTA, one at a time when the Libyans were trying to derail the Juge's inquiry, the other when they wanted to wriggle out of paying compensation.
It would be better to regard Pean as publicist for the Tripoli regime.
Other evidence from the Crowell and Moring submissions to the US civil trial show that the Juge came to Washington in November 1990 and informed a senior group of officials including Vincent Cannistraro, but not including Richard Marquise, of his UTA conclusions.
Only then is the case against the PFLPGC abandoned and that against Libya fleshed (if that is the word for stuff so thin) out.
It is easy to show that SA is not involved. If it's SA, Carlsson is the target, not. so why go to the elaborate complication of getting Mr Carlsson on the evening flight and Mr. Pik Botha off it. Easier to bomb the mid-day flight.
That doesn't prevent the possibility that someone warned SA security to get Botha off the evening flight.
Patrick is also wrong about the money.
In Pugh v Libya the relatives of the 7 US victims were awarded in default judgement a sum of $6B (1B against Libya and $5B against the defendants convicted in absentia in Paris in 1999).
That's $842M/US life, probably a record.
At that level all the Libyan defendants are men of straw so only the $1B is recoverable from the Libyan state. That's still $142M/US life, 14 times what Libya paid out over Lockerbie, and probably 7 times, if that case had come to court.
At that point the US Government stepped and negotiated with the Libyans. The payouts were reduced it is said to $20M to $100M (2 to 10 times Lockerbie)
My research document 'A tale of three atrocities' is available by email at CBNorrie@hotmail.com
Did I rely so heavily on the Bruguiere report? I wrote "the evidence in he UTA case against the six Libyans eventually convicted is largely circumstantial and sometimes quite flimsy" and in my conclusion "the competence and clarity of the Brugiere report" -"obscures many of the evidential shortcomings." and "the Breuguiere report concerns "intelligence" more than evidence." I also point out factual errors, exaggeration and question the fundamental assumption that the bomb was introduced by a "mule" ect. ect.
While I am grateful to Crowell Moring for publishing the Court papers online beyond this they did not supply me with information at all!
According to Mr Haseldine "Bruguière's UTA 772 case against Libya was largely discredited by French investigative journalist Pierre Péan who revealed how the FBI had conspired to incriminate Libya for the sabotage of both Pan Am 103 and UTA 772". Elsewhere Mr Haseldine argues that Lockerbie was a conspiracy between the South African Government and De Beers to murder a UN diplomat, for unintelligible motives, evidenced by someone seeing a light on in his apartment after his death.
I haven't read Pean (who I now understand made similar points concerning the use of the evidence of key witness Bernard Yanga) but understand he argues this "FBI conspiracy was related to the 1990 Gulf War." I believe the plan to blame Libya predated the bombing of Pan Am 103.
I wanted to look at the issue of the UTA timer myself as Mr Haseldine had earlier alleged this was identical to the Lockerbie case. I found it wasn't. (I would also dispute the timer was the sole piece of hard evidence against Megrahi!)
I did in fact write "the fragment bore no trace of explosive residue" - not being a scientist I let the reader draw their own conclusion.
Further I wrote "While the circuit board in the sample timer supplied by Ming-Yong was identical to the fragment recovered this did not necessarily prove this fragment came from one of the timers supplied to Shabbani which involved 101 of the several thousand circuit boards supplied by Tai Yuen." In relation to the accused Shabbani I posed the question "Is there sufficient evidence one of these devices was used in the bomb that destroyed UTA 772 and is there any evidence of guily knowledge?"
What I did find significant was that enquiries concerning the timer were only made after arrest warrants had been issued for four of the accused.
My apologies for the length of this "comment" and even for responding. Mr Haseldine is entitled to his opinion. However his comments bore little relation to what I actually wrote.
I would have found the parallels and contrasts between Pan Am 103 and UTA 772 drawn by "The Masonic Verses" blog to be a lot more interesting had they not relied so heavily upon the report by French judge Jean-Louis Bruguière as well as information supplied by the Washington law firm, Crowell Moring.
ReplyDeleteBruguière's UTA 772 case against Libya was largely discredited by French investigative journalist Pierre Péan who revealed how the FBI had conspired to incriminate Libya for the sabotage of both Pan Am 103 and UTA 772 (see http://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/2001/03/PEAN/14934 "Les preuves trafiquées du terrorisme libyen"). An English translation of the article in "Le Monde Diplomatique" is available at: http://mondediplo.com/2001/03/05libya.
Péan's book was published in March 2001, just after the Pan Am 103 bombing trial had ended with the conviction of Libyan Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi on the strength of just one piece of hard evidence: a tiny fragment of a timing device manufactured by the Swiss firm Mebo.
Two years earlier, six Libyans were tried in absentia and convicted in 1999 by a Paris court for the UTA 772 bombing. Péan claimed there was something wrong: "It is striking to witness the similarity of the discoveries, by the FBI, of the scientific proof of the two aircraft that were sabotaged: the Pan Am Boeing 747 and the UTA DC-10. Among the thousands or rather tens of thousands of pieces of debris collected near the crash sites, just one printed circuit board fragment was found in each case, which carried enough information to allow its identification: Mebo for the Boeing 747 and "TY" (from Taiwan) for the DC-10."
Péan went on to accuse judge Jean-Louis Bruguière of ignoring the results of an analysis by Claude Colisti of the Direction Centrale de la Police Judiciaire (DCPJ) – one of the world's foremost explosives experts – that the "TY" timer fragment had no trace of explosives residue, and could not therefore have been connected to the improvised explosive device that destroyed UTA 772.
Furthermore, neither a forensic inquiry by the Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (DST) nor an examination by the scientific laboratory of the Préfecture de Police (PP) could make any connection between the timer fragment and the bomb. According to Péan, judge Bruguière had therefore taken at face value the word of an FBI political operative - Thomas Thurman - who had been discredited in 1997 by the US Inspector-General, Michael Bromwich, and told never again to appear in court as an expert witness, rather than accept the findings of French forensic experts. It was revealed at the Pan Am 103 bombing trial that the British scientist, Dr Thomas Hayes, had also failed to test the Mebo timer fragment for explosives residue. Such reckless disregard for the integrity of forensic evidence is likely to have the most profound effects upon the Scottish judicial process in relation to Megrahi's second appeal against conviction (see http://www.guardian.co.uk/Lockerbie/Story/0,,2114463,00.html "Libyan jailed over Lockerbie wins right to appeal").
And, finally, it is worth noting that Crowell Moring's civil case against Libya claiming $6 billion in compensation has collapsed as a result of the US-Libya Comprehensive Claims Settlement Agreement, signed in Tripoli on 14 August 2008. One of former President Bush's last acts was to sign (end October 2008) an executive order restoring the Libyan government's immunity from terror-related lawsuits and dismissing all pending compensation cases in the US (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7703110.stm).
So the American law firm still has an axe to grind against Libya.
I too having being studying Lockerbie for many years 17, in my case.
ReplyDeletePatrick, without any evidence, dismisses Jean Bruguiere's inquiry into the UTA disaster. I have read all the parts that were put into English by Crowell and Moring as part of the evidence in the Pugh v. Libya compensation claim. It is formidable, the full evidencerunning to some 38 volumes.
Nothing within it gives any support to Patrick's thesis of South Africa or Pean's of Iran.
That in itself is suspicous. Both UTA and Lockerbie Iranian yet attributed to Libya. Occam seems to have lost his razor here!
Pean has written two books on UTA, one at a time when the Libyans were trying to derail the Juge's inquiry, the other when they wanted to wriggle out of paying compensation.
It would be better to regard Pean as publicist for the Tripoli regime.
Other evidence from the Crowell and Moring submissions to the US civil trial show that the Juge came to Washington in November 1990 and informed a senior group of officials including Vincent Cannistraro, but not including Richard Marquise, of his UTA conclusions.
Only then is the case against the PFLPGC abandoned and that against Libya fleshed (if that is the word for stuff so thin) out.
It is easy to show that SA is not involved. If it's SA, Carlsson is the target, not. so why go to the elaborate complication of getting Mr Carlsson on the evening flight and Mr. Pik Botha off it. Easier to bomb the mid-day flight.
That doesn't prevent the possibility that someone warned SA security to get Botha off the evening flight.
Patrick is also wrong about the money.
In Pugh v Libya the relatives of the 7 US victims were awarded in default judgement a sum of $6B (1B against Libya and $5B against the defendants convicted in absentia in Paris in 1999).
That's $842M/US life, probably a record.
At that level all the Libyan defendants are men of straw so only the $1B is recoverable from the Libyan state. That's still $142M/US life, 14 times what Libya paid out over Lockerbie, and probably 7 times, if that case had come to court.
At that point the US Government stepped and negotiated with the Libyans. The payouts were reduced it is said to $20M to $100M (2 to 10 times Lockerbie)
My research document 'A tale of three atrocities' is available by email at CBNorrie@hotmail.com
Did I rely so heavily on the Bruguiere report? I wrote "the evidence in he UTA case against the six Libyans eventually convicted is largely circumstantial and sometimes quite flimsy" and in my conclusion "the competence and clarity of the Brugiere report" -"obscures many of the evidential shortcomings." and "the Breuguiere report concerns "intelligence" more than evidence." I also point out factual errors, exaggeration and question the fundamental assumption that the bomb was introduced by a "mule" ect. ect.
ReplyDeleteWhile I am grateful to Crowell Moring for publishing the Court papers online beyond this they did not supply me with information at all!
According to Mr Haseldine "Bruguière's UTA 772 case against Libya was largely discredited by French investigative journalist Pierre Péan who revealed how the FBI had conspired to incriminate Libya for the sabotage of both Pan Am 103 and UTA 772". Elsewhere Mr Haseldine argues that Lockerbie was a conspiracy between the South African Government and De Beers to murder a UN diplomat, for unintelligible motives, evidenced by someone seeing a light on in his apartment after his death.
I haven't read Pean (who I now understand made similar points concerning the use of the evidence of key witness Bernard Yanga) but understand he argues this "FBI conspiracy was related to the 1990 Gulf War." I believe the plan to blame Libya predated the bombing of Pan Am 103.
I wanted to look at the issue of the UTA timer myself as Mr Haseldine had earlier alleged this was identical to the Lockerbie case. I found it wasn't. (I would also dispute the timer was the sole piece of hard evidence against Megrahi!)
I did in fact write "the fragment bore no trace of explosive residue" - not being a scientist I let the reader draw their own conclusion.
Further I wrote "While the circuit board in the sample timer supplied by Ming-Yong was identical to the fragment recovered this did not necessarily prove this fragment came from one of the timers supplied to Shabbani which involved 101 of the several thousand circuit boards supplied by Tai Yuen." In relation to the accused Shabbani I posed the question "Is there sufficient evidence one of these devices was used in the bomb that destroyed UTA 772 and is there any evidence of guily knowledge?"
What I did find significant was that enquiries concerning the timer were only made after arrest warrants had been issued for four of the accused.
My apologies for the length of this "comment" and even for responding. Mr Haseldine is entitled to his opinion. However his comments bore little relation to what I actually wrote.
The tragedy of UTA Flight 772 blown up over the Sahara desert 1989
ReplyDeleteplease visit our webpage: http://www.uta772air.ch/
by Edwin and Mahnaz Bollier, MEBO Ltd, Switzerland
Thanks ebol but I cannot access the site - I'm at www.poisonpill@tesco.com
ReplyDelete