Many were complicit
in what amounted to a show trial and their careers continue to flourish.* But
there were also those who swam against the tide of managed conformity.
Al-Megrahi speaks well of his treatment by many individuals in the Scottish
police and prison services, of families who wanted to know what really happened to their murdered relatives,** of lawyers who battled the legal,
political and intelligence establishments of the US and UK.***
The Scottish legal
journal The Firm has kept constant vigil on Lockerbie. Its two-part archive is
invaluable to those wishing to know more.**** Al-Jazeera has produced some good material,
too, and the links to that are available through Ashton’s website.***** And there a few journalists and
politicians who emerge with credit for taking an independent approach to Lockerbie
when career considerations might well have taken them into less controversial
areas.
Yet overall the
al-Megrahi story is a disgraceful one: the compounding of the grief of the
Lockerbie bereaved by a corrupting, state-organised deception that identifies
the wrong person as the cause of their anguish. It is a story told well here by
a determined researcher and the man jailed for something he did not do.
The last words for
now are those of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi:
‘It is ironic that
three of Scotland’s best legal minds believed me to be guilty, yet the ordinary
Scots who got to know me believed I was innocent. To them, and to all the
others who have shown me kindness over the past decade, I offer my heartfelt
thanks. Almost certainly I will die with
the weight of my conviction still on my shoulders. My conscience, however, will
be clear, and until my last breath I shall pray that the real stories of
Lockerbie will one day be known to all.’
* A recent example is reported at
MISSION LOCKERBIE, 2012:
ReplyDeleteIt is urgently necessary that the UN in the "Lockerbie Tragedy", give a decree to the Scottish Justiciary for a criminal follow-up examination, including with the cooperation of Libya, now 'National Transitional Council of Libya' (NTC).
On 9. Sept. 2003, Libya had also expressed (UN press release SC/7866) its commitment to cooperate with any further requests for information in connection with the "Lockerbie investigation".
All those were substantial gains, which could allow Libya to move back into the international community and bring the Council closer to lifting the sanctions.
by Edwin and Mahnaz Bollier, MEBO Ltd. Switzerland. URL: www.lockerbie.ch
Google "the selective use of polygraphs"... In January 1990, Interfor gave three of the baggage handlers polygraphs and two of them were judged as being deceitful when denying any involvement in baggage switching. However, neither the U.S., UK or German investigators showed any interest in the results, or in questioning the baggage handlers. Instead, the polygrapher, James Keefe, was hauled before a Washington grand jury, and, as he puts it, "They were bent on destroying my credibility -- not theirs" [the baggage handlers]. To Interfor, the lack of interest in the polygraph results and the attempt at intimidation of Keefe was the strongest evidence of a cover-up by the various government authorities who did not want their permissive role in the baggage switching to be revealed. http://killinghope.org/bblum6/panam.htm
ReplyDeleteNo wonder nobody was interested. Polygraphs are woo right up there in the homoeopathy class. Ridiculous nonsense. There's no evidence either Roland O'Neil or what's-his-name Tuczu had anything to do with it.
ReplyDeleteNot only that, the entire thing is based on a false premise. Jaafar's luggage got no special treatment, because it was never scheduled to get any special treatment - he had a US passport. If there was any arrangement to go easy on his luggage security-wise, it would have been no more than making sure he wasn't one of the few random passengers selected for a security check. Hardly a difficult undertaking.
If anyone had managed to get to the departure gate luggage room (where O'Neil and Tuczu were working) with an illicit suitcase, the easy thing to do would simply be to add it to the pile of stuff waiting to be loaded on to the 727. There was no bag counting or reconciliation, and no further security check. Why on earth burden yourself with an extraneous suitcase, especially one containing drugs? It's a bonkers plan.
It's not impossible someone simply added a suitcase at Frankfurt of course. There just isn't any evidence at all that they did. And an absolute shedload of evidence that someone added a brown-ish Samsonite suitcase at HEATHROW.
Why did Juval Aviv come out with that fairy-story? Dunno. Maybe he believed it. Anybody who thinks a polygraph is a legitimate method of determining the truth shouldn't be let out without a nurse.