This is the title of a lengthy document published today by the United Kingdom Home Office. Paragraph 1.07 reads in part:
"In December 1988 another commercial passenger aircraft, Pan Am 103, was destroyed by an explosive device over Scotland killing 259 people on board and 11 in the town of Lockerbie where it crashed. This operation, which caused greater loss of life than any other terrorist incident in the UK, before or since, was sponsored and conducted by the Libyan authorities; in 2001 a Libyan national was convicted and sentenced for his role in the incident."
It might perhaps have been worth mentioning that the conviction is under appeal on a reference back to the High Court of Justiciary by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission. But UK Government publications on the subject of terrorism have not been noted for their concern with strict accuracy. The full document can be accessed here.
In the light of this paragraph we might still wonder why, in 814 pages of her memoirs, "The Downing Street Years", Mrs Thatcher never mentions the word "Lockerbie".
ReplyDeleteWas there an agreement with America that we don't talk about matters that might expose our intelligence services to scrutiny and embarrassment?
Mrs Thatcher did write that "the raid on Libya was a far greater success than I could ever have imagined and it put a stop to Libyan sponsored terrorism for yyears to come". This claim was untrue. Libya supplied prodigious quantities of arms, ammunition, explosives and money to the Provisional IRA which in my view was a key motivation behind the official "Libyan solution" to Lockerbie.
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