Lockerbie miscellanea

Here are three Lockerbie-related items that have come to my attention after my return from the Christmas festivities at Gannaga Lodge (and the restoration of telephone and internet connections which were broken in this part of the Roggeveld between the morning of 24th and the evening of 26th December).

24 Years After: Lockerbie and the So-called Libyan Connection is the title of a long article on the World Mathaba website. It contains much interesting material on the history of the Lockerbie affair, the political context, and the “evidence” against Libya. 

One of Alex Miller's books of the year on the Morning Star website is John Ashton's Megrahi: You are my Jury. This is what he says about it:

'This year saw the death of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the man convicted in 2001 of the bombing of Pan Am flight PA103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988.

'John Ashton's Megrahi: You are my Jury is based on extensive interviews with Megrahi and the author worked on Megrahi's legal team in 2006-9.

'The book clearly demonstrates that Megrahi was not - as often portrayed by the mainstream media - an unrepentant terrorist but very likely an innocent victim of a combination of geopolitical manoeuvres involving the US, Libya and Iran and a trial described by a UN observer as "not fair and not conducted in an objective manner".'

Families want truth of 'Libyan Lockerbie' is the headline over an Agence France Presse news agency report published on the News 24 website (and on many others).  The following is a short excerpt:

‘The world has paid much attention to the Lockerbie bombing, which also killed 11 people on the ground in the Scottish town, but few know that another tragedy shook Libya almost exactly four years later.

‘Many in Libya believe Flight LN1103 was downed on 22 December 1992 on the orders of the Gaddafi regime in a bid to win international sympathy in the face of Western sanctions and to deflect attention from the Lockerbie anniversary.

‘For 20 years they grieved in silence and alone.

‘But the suspicion that the "accident" was manufactured persisted, feeding on details such as the similar dates and flight numbers, and the knowledge that the crew of the MiG allegedly involved in the crash both survived.’