The continuing prisoner transfer dispute

The Scottish daily "heavies" have picked up the BBC's Saturday story of the continuing skirmish between the Scottish and UK Governments over the possibility of Megrahi's repatriation to Libya under the recently-concluded prisoner transfer agreement. See The Herald: "Jail term of Lockerbie bomber in Scottish hands"
http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/news/display.var.2015453.0.Jail_term_of_Lockerbie_bomber_in_Scottish_hands.php
and
The Scotsman: "Row erupts over Lockerbie bomber"
http://news.scotsman.com/scotland/Row-erupts-over-Lockerbie-bomber.3739568.jp

The Sunday Post had already led with the story under the headline "Deal done to let bomber go home". See http://www.sundaypost.com/news1.htm.
And the Sunday Mail has the story under the headline "SNP fury over Lockerbie deal". See http://www.sundaymail.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2008/02/03/snp-fury-over-lockerbie-deal-78057-20308398/

Prisoner transfer ... again

The spat between the Scottish Government and the United Kingdom Government over the possibility of Abdel Baset Megrahi benefiting from the prisoner transfer agreement concluded recently between the UK and Libya rumbles on. The BBC News website published a story on Saturday, 2 February about assurances being sought by Scotland’s First Minister, Alex Salmond, that the UK Government had not drafted a transfer agreement that could cover Megrahi. The article reads in part:

‘Scotland's first minister has asked for assurances that the Lockerbie bomber will be excluded from any prisoner transfer deal with Libya.

‘Alex Salmond raised concerns that the Westminster government's position on the issue had changed.

‘It was reported that the UK Government drafted a transfer agreement that could cover Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi.

‘But UK ministers have repeated that no transfer could go ahead without the agreement of the Scottish Government.

‘Mr Salmond spoke out on the issue after the Financial Times reported that Libya had just ratified a £450m contract with oil giant BP, after Westminster ministers drafted a prisoner transfer agreement that it claimed could cover al-Megrahi.’

For the full text, see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/7224194.stm

The truth of the matter is this. The UK Foreign Office (and officials in the office of the then Prime Minister, Tony Blair) entered into negotiations with Libya for a reciprocal prisoner transfer agreement. Both sides were perfectly well aware that the only Libyan prisoner in a British jail about whom the Libyans had the slightest concern was Megrahi. The Libyan negotiators believed, rightly believed, and were known by the UK negotiators to believe that the agreement they were drafting would cover Megrahi. The London Government did not have the courtesy to inform the Scottish Government (which is responsible for prisons and prisoners in Scotland) that these negotiations were taking place. When the Scottish Government found out about them and complained to the UK Government, the latter announced that (a) the proposed agreement was not intended to cover Megrahi and (b) even if it were, the final decision on the transfer of any Libyan prisoner in a Scottish jail would rest with the Scottish Government. The latter proposition was and is correct. The former was not: it was at best disingenuous and at worst (and probably more accurately) an outright lie.

Lockerbie: Chronicle of a Death Foretold

Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer has today published a Lockerbie article under this headline on the OhMyNewsInternational website. It is concerned particularly with the warnings that were received before the destruction of Pan Am 103 and with how those warnings were responded to (or not, as the case may be). The article is a mine of useful information on the Lockerbie tragedy and will be required reading for all who have an interest in the affair. To read Dr Braeckeleer's article in full, go to http://english.ohmynews.com/ArticleView/article_view.asp?menu=A11100&no=381652&rel_no=1&back_url=
I reproduce below the final section, headed Ockam's Razor:
'Not everything that is more difficult is more meritorious. -- St. Thomas Aquinas
'The 14th century English friar and logician William of Ockham is credited to have been the first to suggest the principle according to which the simplest explanation that fits all known facts is usually the right one. Allow me to review the facts.
'Following the Vincennes attack, the Iranian Ambassador at the UN told the world in no ambiguous terms that Iran will seek revenge. In Tehran, Mostashemi, the Iranian Minister of the Interior, promised that the skies will rain blood.
'Mostashemi, and top other Iranian officials, held a series of meetings in Beirut with several members of a well known organization, the PFLP-GC, led by Ahmed Jibril. Iran has colluded with the PFLP-GC before and after the Lockerbie bombing.
'The PFLP-GC was the logical choice for several reasons. The Palestinian group operated in Lebanon under Syrian protection and enjoyed a special relation with Mostashemi who had been the Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon in the 80s.
'The organization had the know-how to manufacture timing devices involving an air-pressure switch for bombs to detonate aboard airplanes. Jibril had operating cells in Europe, including in Germany and Sweden. Last, but not least, Syrian drug Barron al Kasaar, and former associate of Oliver North, could easily bypass the security of Frankfurt airport, thanks to several baggage handlers working for his organization.
'In September, Jibril sent Dalkamoni, his most trusted lieutenant, to Germany in order to organize a cell which, with the collaboration of another PFLP-GC cell from Sweden, had for mission to construct bomb specifically designed to destroy airliners. A few weeks later, Jibril ordered Khreesat, one of his two senior bomb-makers, to join Dalkamoni in Germany.
'In late October, the German authorities arrested most members of both cells. They found four devices built into domestic objects, such as radios and televisions, as well as Pan Am timetables. Several members of the terrorist organization escaped the raid, including Abu Ellias and Abu Talb. A CIA-BKA asset told the FBI that Dalkamoni had passed one bomb to Ellias. Two PFLP-GC members, Goben and Tunayb, have revealed that Ellias planted thebomb in Jafaar's luggage.
'Jafaar met Talb in Sweden and then Jibril in Germany, in mid December. It seems that Jibril convinced Jafaar to carry heroin to the US. A witness described Jafaar as suspiciously agitated as he was waiting to board on Pan Am 103.
'The Germans tested one of these bombs by taking it up in a 747. They established that a bomb detonated by these timers would go off between 32 and 42 minutes after take-off. Flight 103 was in the air for 38 minutes before it blew up, right in the middle of the time frame.
'Last October, former CIA operative Robert Baer told David Horovitz that the bomb that exploded on Pan Am 103 was one of Dalkamoni devices.
'A high ranking Iranian defector testified that Iranian agents planted the bomb parts in Frankfurt, and that the bomb was assembled in London. (See Confession of an Iranian Terror Czar) Jibril and Kasaar were seen having diner alone in a Paris restaurant just weeks before the bombing. The BKA concluded that the bomb started its journey in Frankfurt.
'During the first appeal, in 2002, it was revealed that there had been a break-in at Heathrow the night before the bombing. The Iranian Air facility was immediately adjacent to the baggage assembly area where transit luggage for Flight 103 was loaded.
'The chief baggage handler, John Bedford, testified that, when he returned from a coffee break, he saw two additional suitcases had been loaded into the relevant container for Flight 103.
'The crash investigators established that the explosion occurred precisely where those cases had been placed, above a single layer of baggage that Bedford had already packed into the container.
'The day prior to the bombing, various Intelligence Agencies intercepted communications informing Iranian Officials of the whereabouts of McKee and his rescue team.
'Two day after the bombing, communication intercepts indicate that Tehran ordered their Ambassador in Beirut to pay Jibril Organization for the successful operation. The transfer of the money is recorded and Dalkamoni was in possession of the Paris bank account number when he was arrested.
'Dalkamoni was rewarded for his services to the "Islamic revolutionary struggle against the West." The Iranian citation praises Dalkamoni for achieving the greatest-ever strike against the West.
'Moreover, $500,000 was transferred on April 25, 1989 to the Degussa bank of Frankfurt and deposited on the account of Mohammed Abu Talb. In his agenda, Talb had circled, the date of the Lockerbie bombing. In his apartment, police found clothes bought in Malta. Talb had met with Dalkamoni in Cyprus during October.
'Talb was in Malta on November 23 when clothes surrounding the bomb are believed to have been bought. The owner of the shop had initially identified him. He confessed his participation in the Lockerbie bombing and then retracted his confession without any explanation. His wife was heard telling in a phone conversation to Palestinian friends "to get rid of the clothes."
'Incidentally, Abu Talb likes his friends to call him by his nom de guerre, namely Abu Intekam, Father of Revenge, the very codename given by Mostashemi to the Lockerbie bombing operation.

'Si non e vero, e bene trovato.'

Libya jail swap deal clears way for BP project

The Financial Times of 31 January 2008 contains an article under this headline by Dino Mahtani in London and Andrew Bolger in Edinburgh asserting that Libya’s ratification of a $900m oil exploration contract with BP was delayed because of Libyan concerns over the position of Abdel Baset al-Megrahi under the prisoner transfer agreement negotiated with the UK government.

The exploration contract was apparently part of a package of agreements arranged by the former UK Prime Minister, Tony Blair, on an official visit to Libya last year. But ratification of BP's deal had been left hanging for months, with Libyan negotiators saying they were angered that Mr Blair had left open the possibility of excluding Megrahi, the Libyan jailed for his part in the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, from a deal to repatriate Libyan prisoners held in British jails. But, in spite of a request from the Scottish Government for the specific exclusion of Megrahi from its terms, the agreement as finally concluded does not make him an exception. This provoked anger in the Scottish Government and Parliament, politicians there accusing London of ignoring Scottish legal procedures in order to smooth relations with Libya.

However, the article refers to Westminster sources as insisting that safeguards were in place to give Scottish ministers a veto over whether Mr Megrahi would return. It also quotes Saad Djebbar, a London-based lawyer who has worked with the Libyans on the Lockerbie case as saying: "The matter of Megrahi had delayed matters, not just for BP but all other commercial arrangements." He said that Tripoli had been waiting for a sign of "goodwill". BP denied there were political reasons for the delay to ratification of the deal.

See http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/703dc9e4-cfa0-11dc-854a-0000779fd2ac.html

Unfinished business -- Sir John Scarlett

I have received e-mails from (a) Patrick Haseldine and (b) Trowbridge Ford (to both of whom I express my thanks) about the post Sir John Scarlett, continued (see http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2008/01/sir-john-scarlett-continued.html). They are as follows:

(a)

Dear Robert,

The state-sponsored terrorism of apartheid South Africa

I am somewhat baffled by these remarks made by Trowbridge Ford: "what ruined Patrick Haseldine's career after he had revived them when MI6 had gone belatedly to such trouble to hush them up in the first place" (Sir John Scarlett, continued - 27 January 2008). If all that Professor Ford means is that it was my December 1988 accusation of state-sponsored terrorism against apartheid South Africa that brought my career in HM Diplomatic Service to an abrupt end, then I agree with him (see "A member of the Foreign Office was willing to go public with a criticism that would almost certainly lose him his job and career" James Rusbridger The Intelligence Game (1991) ISBN 0-370-31242-2 http://books.google.com/books?id=p62LN9EhsKYC&pg=PA141&lpg=PA141&dq=patrick+haseldine&source=web&ots=mxcb2zX6R9&sig=IkihvG6TuKWldw-V1qtsisBAEVs).
Mine was not exactly a lone voice in the wilderness at the time since Governor Michael Dukakis, Democrat nominee in the 1988 presidential election campaign, would have declared apartheid South Africa to be a "terrorist state" had he won the November 1988 election (see http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DEFDC133BF930A25755C0A96E948260).

In an article published on the now defunct Pan Am 103/Lockerbie crash website entitled Lockerbie Trial : A Better Defence Of Incrimination, I accused apartheid South Africa of responsibility for a number of terrorist incidents including the February 1986 Olof Palme assassination and the September 1986 Samora Machel aircrash, as well as the December 1988 Lockerbie bombing (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Patrick_Haseldine/Archive4, http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C06E1DB103CF93AA1575AC0A960958260 and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olof_Palme_assassination#South_Africa_theory).

As can be seen from the last of the ten letters published in The Guardian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Patrick_Haseldine#Letters_to_The_Guardian), I do not subscribe to any complicated or convoluted conspiracy theories about the Lockerbie bombing. Instead, I simply apply the Occam's Razor principle to the problem:

Flight path (December 22, 1993)

"Now that the case against Libya has been undermined by Edwin Bollier's revised evidence (Guardian, December 20), it is time to cut through the mess of theory on the culpability for Lockerbie. Applying the scientific principle of Occam's Razor to the problem (look for the simplest solution), the first question to ask is: what was so special about Pan Am Flight 103 to make it the target of international terrorism?

"The answer is that Bernt Carlsson, UN Commissioner for Namibia, was on that flight to New York to attend the signing ceremony at UN headquarters of Namibia's Independence Agreement.

"The second question is: who would want to assassinate Mr Carlsson? Many whites in Southern Africa were openly hostile to granting independence to Namibia. By murdering 258 other passengers, those responsible must have hoped to throw suspicion elsewhere and disguise their motive. Then there is the circumstantial evidence involving South Africa's Foreign Minister, Pik Botha, who was to have accompanied Mr Carlsson but instead took an earlier flight.

"The third question is: why has it taken so long for the finger of suspicion to point towards South Africa?

"I posed an identical question in the Guardian on December 7, 1989. Only an international inquiry of the kind proposed by Dr Jim Swire is likely to reveal the answer."

It is not too late to institute a United Nations Inquiry into the so far uninvestigated state-sponsored terrorism of apartheid South Africa. Libya - currently in the chair of the UN Security Council - seems well placed to ensure that such a UN Inquiry takes place in the very near future (see http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/12/387992.html).

Yours sincerely,

Patrick Haseldine.

And (b)

Dear Robert Black,

Thanks for posting my e-mail.

I did notice in your posting of the three links, though, you actually linked my article about Lockerbie three times instead of all three once - what seems to have been mistakes that you might want to correct.

I shall be doing more about the tragedy, and will let you know when I do.

Sincerely,

Trowbridge.

[Note by RB: I posted Professor Ford's original e-mail in the form in which I received it, and without alteration.]

Rewards for Justice ... again

A lengthy posting on the unbossed.com website contains the following passage on the Lockerbie case:
‘An article in yesterday's Canada Free Press points out that rewards, no matter how large, are pretty ineffective in bringing terrorist suspects to justice. “The U.S. Department of Justice, even after posting rewards, setting up hotlines, and issuing BOLOs (“Be-on-the-Lookout” alerts) has failed to issue criminal warrants for their arrest...”
‘The State Department's Rewards for Justice program website includes a curious request for tips related to those responsible for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. It doesn't explain why it's still looking for suspects. After all, Abdel Baset Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi was sentenced to 27 years in prison after witnesses were offered money by the U.S. government to provide testimony needed for conviction.
‘A witness in the Lockerbie case has claimed he was offered $4 million (£2 million) by American investigators to lie to the trial judges.
‘Edwin Bollier, head of the Swiss company MEBO that was said to have manufactured the timer used to detonate the Pan Am bomb, claims he was offered the money by the FBI at its Washington HQ in exchange for making a statement that supported the main line of inquiry - that Libya was responsible for the bombing. "I rejected this and said this could not possibly be the case," he said. He added that there was a "loud dispute" after he rejected the offer. (The Scotsman)
‘Reportedly, the courts are poised to acknowledge that the conviction of Abdel Basit Ali Megrahi was a "miscarriage of justice," due in part to yet another offer of money - $2 million from the CIA - to a witness whose testimony was critical to the conviction of Megrahi, who maintains he is innocent.
‘Assuming that what appear to be the present facts are true and Megrahi is indeed freed means that Libya, which agreed to pay $10 million to each of the families of the Pan Am crash victims, is not guilty. That opens the possibility of a serious look for the real culprit who so criminally snuffed out 270 lives. Somebody is guilty of a heinous crime. But who? (WRMEA)
‘Who, indeed? Are Americans and others around the world safer because our government helps convict people who had little or nothing to do with terrorist attacks? Of course not. We are less safe because our watchdogs, under weak oversight, have grown fat and inept, unable to catch anything but the easiest prey. But, catch something they must. So, out come the checkbooks.
‘Whether the money buys truth or lies seemingly is irrelevant, and most Americans are never the wiser until another attack occurs. When one does, the bureaucrats and their enablers in Congress label it an "extraordinary" event; something that could happen to any mortal being, don't you know? And, then, it's business as usual until the next "failure of imagination" occurs. Are we a gullible people, or what?’
See http://unbossed.com/?p=1764

A regrettable anniversary

Seven years ago today the Scottish Court at Camp Zeist convicted Abdel Baset al-Megrahi of the murder of 270 people in the Lockerbie disaster. The unjustness of the conviction has been demonstrated in earlier postings on this blog. See eg
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2007/07/lockerbie-satisfactory-process-but.html
and
http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2007/07/article-in-scotsman-on-23-july-2007.html.

It is to be hoped that this miscarriage of justice will have been rectified before the eighth anniversary. But this is, at least in part, dependent upon the willingness of the Criminal Appeal Court in the new appeal to frustrate the delaying and obstructionist tactics that the Crown has so far been resorting to in its approach to the proceedings.

Resumption of service

I hope to be in a position to make substantive postings on this blog tomorrow (Thursday) evening, South African time (GMT +1). My internet connection problems have rendered posting impossible over the past few days.

Sir John Scarlett, continued

On 7 January 2008, I posted an excerpt from an article by Trowbridge Ford on the career of Sir John Scarlett, the current Director of SIS (see http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2008/01/sir-john-scarlett.html).

I have just received an e-mail from Professor Ford, which I am happy to reproduce here:

Dear Robert Black,

I see that you have posted part of my second article about SIS's director general Sir John Scarlett -one of four articles I am writing about the most misguided agent - but I notice that even in posting it, you left other parts of it which had caused him to cover up the assassination of Sweden's statsminister Olof Palme on February 28, 1986 here in Stockholm.

Instead of acting as if it were completely separated from the Lockerbie tragedy, you should have stressed it, including these other articles on mine:

http://www.skog.de/writers/e0408831.htm
http://codshit.blogspot.com/2004/02/nsc-s-lt-colonel-oliver-north-from-key.html
http://www.i-p-o.org/THFord-Lockerbie-why_only_silence-Sept05.htm

The Libyans were set up to take the fall for Palme's assassination, once it could not safely be pinned on the Soviets or any lone domestic nut, and once, the case against Gaddafi started to unravel, it was blamed on the South Africans.

Jan Bondeson recently revived SIS's original complaint against them in Blood on the Snow (pp. 171-3) - what ruined Patrick Haseldine's career after he had revived them when MI6 had gone belatedly to such trouble to hush them up in the first place.

In short, in dealing with Anglo-American conspiracies since Reagan stole the 1980 presidential election, one has to look at the whole, big picture rather than cutting it up into pieces which covert operators and academics can safely deal with.

Sincerely yours,

Trowbridge Ford

Police seek extra funding for Lockerbie appeal

The BBC reports that Dumfries and Galloway Police have requested additional funds from the Scottish Government to cover the costs incurred in respect of work generated by the new appeal in the Lockerbie case ordered by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission.

Chief Constable Pat Shearer said it meant extra financial pressure on the force for some time to come.

"It is hard to just estimate how long that will continue for," he said.

"Quite clearly the defence team are exploring their options and building their case.

"We are very much acting and supporting the Crown Office in relation to their requests."

He said that effort meant there would be costs incurred for the foreseeable future.

"We need to have the resources in force to enable us to support that professionally," he said.

See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/south_of_scotland/7205493.stm

Patrick Haseldine on Lockerbie

I am grateful to Patrick Haseldine for the following e-mail setting out his reasons for believing that apartheid South Africa may have been responsible for the bombing of Pan Am 103:

Dear Robert,

Now that a "US court orders Libya to pay $6bn" in damages to the relatives of seven US victims of the September 1989 UTA Flight 772 bombing, and to the American owner of the DC-10 aircraft (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7191278.stm), the United Nations should investigate both Pan Am Flight 103 (http://indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/12/387992.html) and UTA Flight 772.

The way that Libya was "fitted up" for both crimes is succinctly explained by French investigative journalist, Pierre Péan, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Péan#FBI_fabricated_evidence_against_Libya.

The obvious starter question for the UN Inquiry to address is: But if Libya didn't do it, who did?

There is no shortage of suspects but for my money apartheid South Africa is the clear favourite. This is why:

1. The Reagan/Gorbachev summit in Moscow in May 1988 decided that South Africa had to grant Namibia its independence, in return for Cuba's withdrawal of troops from Angola and the cutting off of military aid by the Soviet Union (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Accords)

2. It was US presidential election year in 1988, and Democrat nominee Michael Dukakis would have declared South Africa to be a "terrorist state" (along with Libya and Iran) if he were elected US president (see http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DEFDC133BF930A25755C0A96E948260).

3. South Africa's nightmare was to have SWAPO take control of Namibia with more than 66% of the vote, since this would have allowed SWAPO to re-write the independence constitution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Namibia#Negotiations_and_transition). Measures were therefore taken for South Africa's Civil Cooperation Bureau to disrupt the election process, to harass the UN Special Representative Martti Ahtisaari (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martti_Ahtisaari#Diplomatic_career) and to take out prominent SWAPO activists (eg Anton Lubowski). The Koevoet paramilitary force was also deployed to prevent SWAPO's military wing returning from overseas bases. And, according to The Guardian of July 26, 1991, Foreign Minister Pik Botha told a press conference that the South African government had paid more than £20 million to at least seven political parties in Namibia to oppose SWAPO in the run-up to the 1989 elections. He justified the expenditure on the grounds that South Africa was at war with SWAPO at the time.

4. UN Commissioner for Namibia, Bernt Carlsson, was in an anomalous position. In theory, Carlsson was the UN's Governor of Namibia (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=940DE4D9143EF931A15751C1A96E948260). But, United Nations authority over Namibia was never recognised by the South African Government, who administered the territory through an Administrator-General, Louis Pienaar, and it is unclear what role Bernt Carlsson would have played in the run-up to Namibia's independence. A UN Inquiry into Carlsson's death on Pan Am Flight 103 will doubtless help to resolve this anomaly.

The full text of ten letters I had published in The Guardian is at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Patrick_Haseldine#Letters_to_The_Guardian. The first letter was published 14 days before the Lockerbie bombing. The nine subsequent letters all seek to incriminate the apartheid regime for Pan Am Flight 103, and one even suggests that South Africa was responsible for the UTA Flight 772 bombing (The bearer of strange tidings from Islamic Jihad)!

Yours sincerely,

Patrick.

The Congressional Quarterly article

Here is the text of Jeff Stein’s recent article in Congressional Quarterly, as relayed to me by Richard Marquise, to whom I express my appreciation.

‘My Dec. 20 column warning that “Libya is close to getting off the hook” for millions of dollars due families who suffered the loss of loved ones in the Pan Am 103 and LaBelle discotheque bombings drew plenty of heat.

‘Some suggested that I had somehow taken Libya’s side by merely reporting on the conclusion of a Scottish criminal commission that a “miscarriage of justice” might have occurred in the Pan Am trial. Critics who support that view point to the early suspicions of U.S. intelligence that an Iranian-back terrorist group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, had really downed the airliner (in response to the accidental downing of an Iranian passenger jet by a U.S. Navy ship six months earlier).

‘Critics also denounced my reporting that at least two informants had received million-dollar rewards for providing evidence against the Libyans.

‘One of those who wrote me was the FBI agent in charge of the U.S. side of the PanAm 103 case, retired Special Agent Richard Marquise. After several e-mail exchanges, I invited him to write a critique for publication here. It is reproduced in its entirety below:

“We initially speculated it was the PFLP-GC based on events which had occurred in Germany in late 1988. We went with that premise until the painstaking evidence collection in Scotland (done by police officers not having any political agenda) turned the investigation in a different direction.

“By this time, we had reached an agreement with the CIA and other intelligence agencies to completely share information. With their assistance and the meticulous police investigation, this led to the eventual indictments.

“You quote several sources but Vince Cannistraro [the CIA official in charge of the agency’s investigation of PanAm 103] retired before the evidence began to lead to Libya.

“Your quote ‘more sinister factors were at work in the investigation’ which was attributed to Professor Black and other ‘authoritative sources close to the case’ is taken from people who only know what they believe but have no inside information.

“I can promise you as a 31-year FBI veteran who was proud of my service to America; no sinister forces were ever involved. If you (or anyone) were to speak with Stuart Henderson (the Scottish Senior Investigating Officer) or myself, we would tell you we followed the evidence, the way we were trained and no political or sinister forces were involved. Libya was implicated because of the evidence, not because we wanted to blame someone other than Syrian-backed terrorists.

“Edwin Bollier, the Swiss businessman who made the timer which blew up Pan Am Flight 103, seems to forget he went to a US Embassy in January 1989 after reading in the news that the ‘evidence’ pointed to the PFLP-GC cell in Germany (and therefore to Syria). He left an unsigned note implicating Libya — long before we knew anything about the timer, MEBO or Bollier, as that evidence was not developed until nearly two years would pass.

“Since 1992, Bollier’s story has changed. I would prefer to believe what he told a Swiss magistrate, the FBI and Scottish investigators in 1990 and 1991, not what he is now saying. I was the FBI official who met with Mr. Bollier in Washington, and I can assure you no one offered him (or any other witness for that matter) anything to implicate the Libyan Government.”

Note by RB: I simply wish to record my continuing conviction that the evidence led at the Lockerbie trial was insufficient to establish the guilt of Mr Megrahi (see the first posting on this blog in July 2007); that evidence that pointed in a different direction was suppressed and was not passed on to the defence; and that as a result of the forthcoming appeal necessitated by the (three-year long) investigation and findings of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, the unjustifiability of Mr Megrahi’s conviction will be clearly demonstrated.

[I eventually managed to maintain an internet connection for long enough to post this.]

Congressional Quarterly

On 20 December 2007, Congressional Quarterly published an article by Jeff Stein reporting the burgeoning doubts regarding the safety of the conviction of Abdel Baset Megrahi for the Lockerbie bombing. This is referred to in a posting on this blog on 21 December. Richard A Marquise, who headed the FBI team that investigated the destruction of Pan Am 103 (and author of a book on the subject) has sent me a further article under Jeff Stein's byline in Congressional Quarterly, in which Mr Marquise is quoted expressing his confidence in the integrity of the investigation and the safety of the conviction of Mr Megrahi.

Because of the instability and slowness of my internet connection, I have been unable, in spite of valiant efforts, to post the full text of this new article on this blog. But I shall do so as soon as I find myself in a location which has an internet café with a broadband connection.

Inquests and Fatal Accident Inquiries

The Herald of 17 January 2008 has a lengthy article by Anne Johnstone about the circus that is the Diana and Dodi inquest. In the course of it, she refers as follows to the Fatal Accident Inquiry that took place after the destruction of Pan Am 103:

"It's easy to be smug, but it's hard to believe that this nonsense would have been allowed to unfold in Scotland. Fatal accident inquiries under a sheriff are the Scottish equivalent of the coroner's inquest. As well as covering deaths at work or in custody, they can be called by the Lord Advocate on the grounds that the death was sudden, suspicious, unexplained or gives rise to public concern. The biggest in recent years was for the Lockerbie disaster in which 270 people lost their lives. It took 61 days and cost £3m. In the Diana inquest that sum will barely cover security."

See
http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/featuresopinon/display.var.1971389.0.The_show_that_makes_a_mockery_of_legal_process.php

Rewards for Justice

The Sunday Post, the Scottish Sunday newspaper with the largest readership, published the following article by Adam Docherty about payment to witnesses in the Lockerbie trial on 13 January 2008:

'THE US justice department paid for evidence that helped convict Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi for the Lockerbie bombing.

'With the next hearing in Megrahi's High Court Appeal due to take place next month, the admission casts a dark shadow over testimony at the original trial -- and the safety of the conviction.

'The Washington DC-based 'Rewards for Justice' organisation boasts that it has paid out more than 72 million dollars to over 50 people who have provided information that prevented international terrorist attacks or have brought to justice those involved in prior acts. Included on its website, in a list of those brought to justice, is Megrahi. Due to a strict policy of confidentiality Rewards for Justice will not name the witnesses nor divulge the exact amount paid to them.

'In June last year the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission referred Megrahi's case back to the Court of Appeal after a three-year inquiry. They found six areas of concern and are believed to have uncovered a £2-million reward paid by the CIA to key witness, Maltese shopkeeper Tony Gauci.

'Gauci was the only witness to link Megrahi directly to the bomb, and was therefore instrumental in convicting him on 31 January 2001. Gauci told the trial that Megrahi bought clothes in his shop, which were later used to wrap the bomb.

'At the trial, Gauci appeared uncertain about the exact date he sold the clothes in question, and was not entirely sure that it was Megrahi to whom they were sold. Nonetheless, Megrahi's appeal against conviction was rejected by the Scottish Court in the Netherlands in March 2002. Five years after the trial, former Lord Advocate, Lord Fraser of Carmyllie, publicly described Gauci as being "an apple short of a picnic" and "not quite the full shilling".

'Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was killed in the 1988 bombing, is convinced that Megrahi is innocent. Yesterday he said that such huge sums offered to witnesses could encourage them to perjury.

'"Many jurists would consider that promises of money to secure 'evidence' from any individual do not accord with the principles of justice," he explained.

'"It is the timing of such promises rather the payments themselves that determine whether the 'evidence' is likely to be degraded. To many such witnesses such sums would alter their lives.

'"And such promises of money, if concealed from court -- or perhaps divulged only to prosecution -- could be considered a deliberate perversion of justice.

'"Witnesses are supposed to serve the truth. But the old Scots adage holds firm here - 'He who pays the piper calls the tune'.

'"This document gives some idea of the scale of the payments. It also removes any doubt as to whether payments were, indeed, made in this case."

The newspaper also published an article containing Dr Swire's detailed reactions to the revelations. These included the following:

'I entered the Zeist trial believing (as the British Foreign secretary had told us) that there was conclusive evidence of Libya's guilt, and none concerning the guilt of any other nation.

'This was the reason that we, the UK relatives, had made every conceivable effort, including three visits to Colonel Gaddafi, to persuade him to allow his citizens to undergo trial under Scottish criminal justice.

'Within days of the start of the trial at Zeist it became clear that fundamental requirements for the collection of evidence for a criminal trial had been breached, when the court was told that a suitcase, belonging to one of the US passengers had been removed from the crash site, by persons unknown, cut open, and then returned for the Scottish searchers to find, with some of its contents put back and even labelled with the name of the owner.

'The court accepted that the rectangular cutting into that suitcase could not have been a result of the explosion, but appeared unfazed by the possible implications for other items allegedly recovered as evidence. This had intense relevance later in the case to the question of a fragment of timer circuit board, the key forensic 'link' to the credibility of the bomb ever having started from Malta.

'There was evidence of the presence of numerous unidentified US agents roaming the site at a very early stage - a situation which the resources of the Scottish police could never have been expected to anticipate or control.

'From this unhappy start, the picture grew of how certain intelligence agencies had contributed to the assembly of much of the evidence. Intelligence services act in support of the perceived advantage of the countries for which they work: this may or may not be consistent with seeking the truth.

'Remember that for this trial there was no jury.

'Now, as you report, we have the proud exhibition by 'Rewards for Justice' in Washington DC of their use of 'more than 72 million dollars' in persuading witnesses to give evidence in terror-related cases. Former Lord Advocate, Lord Fraser of Carmyllie's, post trial assessment of the key witness, Mr Gauci, as being 'one apple short of a picnic' was not vouchsafed to the court, but can only serve now to emphasize the possibility that an offer of cash might have affected the evidence that Mr Gauci was willing to give.

'As a layman, I emerged from the Zeist hearings convinced that the verdict should never have been reached.'