Thursday 29 September 2011

Libya ready to probe possible other Lockerbie suspects

[This is the headline over a report published yesterday by the Reuters news agency.  It reads in part:]

Libya's interim justice minister Mohammed al-Alagi said on Wednesday he was ready to work with Scottish authorities to probe the possible involvement of others in the Lockerbie bombing apart from the sole Libyan convicted for the attack.

His remark at news conference reversed a position he took only on Monday, when he said that as far as Libya was concerned the case of the bombing of the U.S.-bound airliner over the Scottish village of Lockerbie with the loss of 270 lives was closed.

Scottish prosecutors had asked Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC) to give them access to papers or witnesses that could implicate more suspects in the attack, possibly including deposed leader Muammar Gaddafi.

Asked on Wednesday about his response to this request, he said through an interpreter: "I'd like to confirm that we are accepting any facts that might arise in this regard, if there is any suspicion about any other person." 

He added: "We will cooperate in this regard with whoever has any other facts, according to international treaties." (...)

Alagi added on Wednesday that he welcomed the possibility of an investigation into the possibility of others' culpability because "this will lead to the acquittal of Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, who has been unjustly convicted in this case". 

[Today's edition of The Scotsman contains a related report, as does The Herald which, for some reason, does not see fit in its report to mention the portion of Mr Alagi's statement that I have italicised above. This aspect is, however, stressed in the news item in Scottish lawyers' magazine The Firm.]

3 comments:

  1. MISSION LOCKERBIE, 2011, (Doc. nr. 7026.rtf.)
    Discovery: The future Libyan Consul Mr. Sliman Bouchuiguir (NTC) for the Libyan embassy in Bern Switzerland, wrote on 4 September 2009 the following letter to Prime Minister Brown:

    Prime Minister Gordon Brown
    10 Downing StreetLondon SW1A 2AA
    United Kingdom

    4 September 2009

    Dear Prime minister,

    The Libyan League for Human Rights, a Libyan NGO in exile, member of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and of the Euro-Mediterranean human rights network (EMHRN), is writing to you, on an urgent basis, to draw your attention to the unclear health conditions of Mr. Abdelbasit Al-Megrahi, the only person convicted for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, that killed 270 people and to the legal responsibilities of the UK government in his safety and the protection and preservation of his health. We understand that Mr. Al Megrahy, who was allowed recently to return to Libya after spending 8 of his 27 years sentence in Scottish prison, has become an unwanted prisoner and his mere existence has perhaps become cumbersome, but we believe that this cannot be used as an excuse to precipitate his death through medical negligence or to eliminate him through loose and slack security protection. Mr. Al Megrahi remains the only witness of the suffering of millions of people in the UK , the US , in Libya (effects of the embargo) and elsewhere. His health and safety are all the more important that he made it clear that he is resolute to make public all the facts about Lockerbie crime and that those facts will, in his words, leave not even the slightest doubt about his innocence.

    continued below >>>

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  2. Mr. Prime Minister,

    It is good that the international community hears what Mr. Megrahi has to say and for this there is an urgent need that his life is protected and that his safety is enhanced. Libya’s medical infrastructures are far from being satisfactory as may be indicated by the number of Libyans who seek medical care abroad, in Tunisia, Egypt and Jordan in particular, and as attested by the mysterious death in custody in May 2009 of Mr. Fathi El-Jahmi, a prominent Libyan Human right Defender. It is therefore urgent that a British medical team be sent to Tripoli to support the work of the Libyan medical team in charge of Mr. Al-Megrahi’s medical file. it is also important that Physicians from independent medical NGOs are invited to participate in the same endeavour to avoid to Mr. Megrahi what Mr. El-Jahmi experienced months in the same medical facility; the Tripoli Medical Centre, that led to his unexplained death.

    I thank you for your attention to this important and urgent matter.

    Yours sincerely,

    Sliman Bouchuiguir (Ph-D)
    Secretary General
    The League for Human Rights

    by Edwin and Mahnaz Bollier, MEBO Ltd., Switzerland. URL: www.lockerbie.ch

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  3. Mission Lockerbie, 2011 Doc. nr.7027.rtf. (google translation, german/english):

    On 23 February 2011, shortly after the start of the uprising against the Gadhafi regime the defected former justice minister Mustafa Abdel Jalil, in a interview of newspaper "Expressen", claimed he have proofs that Gaddafi "gave the order on "Lockerbie" and Abdelbaset Al Megrahi transported the Bombcase via Malta Air to Frankfurt--London/Heathrow. That was probably another reason why NATO intervened in the conflict...
    Between June and September 2011, the U.S. and UK have officially asked the Libyan National Transitional Council (NTC) for any information and proofs on bombing of Pan Am 103 in 1988.

    On 26 September '11, Mohammed al-Alagi, the NTC justice minister, says: "the case is closed on the 1988 Lockerbie airplane bombing and al- Al-Megrahi has already been judged once and he will not be judged again. We do not hand over Libyan citizens. Gaddafi does"...
    After US senators put pressure on NCT, minister Al-Age changed its statement and say, the country's new regime will co-operate in further investigations. He added: "We will cooperate in the regard with wohever has any other facts, according to international treaties".
    This is good, because now there is an opportunity that Libya's "NTC" can demand from Crown Office for "Return-Law" (International Legal Assistance) -- for opening the secret files of the Scotish Criminal Cases Reappeal Commission (SCCRC ) and the Statement of Polic-officer, Witness (alias) "GOLFER" for clear up the "Lockerbie Affair" !

    by Edwin and Mahnaz Bollier, MEBO Ltd. Switzerland. URL: www.lockerbie.ch

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