Edinburgh Fringe Review: The “Lockerbie Bomber”

[This is the heading over a review by Dan Hutton on the website A Younger Theatre.  It reads in part:]

With al-Megrahi and Gadaffi dead, many may assume that the debate surrounding the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie is now over. Kenneth N Ross’s The “Lockerbie Bomber”, however, suggests that there is still plenty of room for interrogation of the case, as the facts surrounding the case and its subsequent investigation are filled with holes. The subject matter, dubbed Scotland’s “national shame”, feels urgent as the country gears up for its referendum on independence (...)

The six characters begin as three discrete couples: the parents of a child lost in the attacks; a pair of newspaper reporters attempting to uncover the truth; and a politician and US agent scheming to disseminate their version of events. Though the first third bombards us with facts and on-theme speechifying, a clear if thin narrative soon emerges, seeing the parents questioned by the media who are in turn threatened by the US agency. Ross’s attacks on the media, governments and the judiciary system are all spot-on, but come so thick and fast that it often feels too much is being crammed in, thus meaning the whole piece lacks any real depth. 

The inverted commas in the title soon reveal the lack of hard evidence around the case, asking us to reevaluate who we refer to when we utter those words: at one point, the father suggests that “governments decide what the truth is”. As the journalists report, the evidence leading to al-Megrahi’s conviction is dubious and the journey the suitcase apparently took is at least a little far-fetched. But though we get facts, the excess of monologues often slows down the pace. 

Alan Clark’s production, presented by Nugget Theatre Company, does the best that it can with the text, and features strong performance from its ensemble. Both Clark himself and Maggie McInnes manage to make the journalists rounded individuals even when committing questionable acts for a story, and the scenes between Brian Paterson’s agent and Craig Murray’s politician are tense. But it is the calmly played, understated moments between Carol Clark and Jim Allan’s Liz and Bill Pasquall which are the most human, and during these scenes the play comes closest to uncovering “truth”. 

A smart lighting design by Jim Allan and Andrew Murphy makes use of limited equipment in the small space, whilst Richard Mackintosh’s sound adds context to scene changes (though I question the somewhat heavy-handed use of Barber’s Adagio for Strings at the end). A minimal set design features the debris from a crashed aircraft, initially in wreckage across the stage but slowly uprighted and tidied throughout: only through talking and sharing can we begin to fix the carnage left by acts like this. 

The “Lockerbie Bomber” is at C Venues until 13 August. For more information and tickets visit https://www.edfringe.com/whats-on/theatre/lockerbie-bomber.

[A four star review of the play can be read here on the Broadway Baby website.]

Give us Lockerbie probe, Alex

This is the headline over a report published today in the Scottish edition of The Sun. The one sentence that is accessible in front of the newspaper's paywall reads: "Lockerbie campaigner Dr Jim Swire last night called on Alex Salmond to launch a probe into the jet bombing."

If any reader of this blog who has access to the full article cares to send me the text, I shall reproduce excerpts from it here.

Justice for Megrahi's petition for an independent inquiry into the Lockerbie investigation and the prosecution, trial and conviction of Abdelbaset Megrahi (of which Dr Swire is one of the sponsors) can be read here.  

Addendum: I am grateful to Alan Clark, author of The "Lockerbie Bomber" play for sending me this copy of The Sun's article.

click on image to enlarge

Review of the Fringe production Lockerbie: Lost Voices

Yesterday evening I was privileged to attend the first night (after two previews) of The Elements World Theatre’s production of Lee Gershuny’s play Lockerbie: Lost Voices. Also in the audience at the packed Netherbow Theatre in The Scottish Storytelling Centre were Lockerbie relatives Jim, Jane and William Swire (father, mother and brother of Flora) and Marina de Larracoechea (sister of Nieves, one of the flight attendants killed on Pan Am 103).

Six passengers -- only one of whom is based, very loosely, on an identifiable victim of the tragedy -- are seen first in the Pan Am lounge at Heathrow Airport and then on board the aircraft. They are three disparate couples whose characters, back stories, hopes and dreams are tellingly and subtly painted through the words that they speak to each other and through body language and facial expression. The destruction of the plane, when it inevitably comes, is one of the most shocking and harrowing scenes that I have ever experienced in a theatre. The final scene brings all of the characters together in a stylised but intensely moving chorus and antiphon of the dead.

This is a poignant and piercing play, magnificently acted and staged.  It would be wrong, though, to give the impression that it consists of an hour of unrelieved misery and gloom.  There are deft touches of humour, particularly from the play’s most likeable characters, an American married couple, Alan and Louise.  I cannot recommend the play too highly.

"What we do know is that there's been a cover up"

[What follows is excerpted from a report published today on the BBC News website:]

The Edinburgh Fringe, which officially begins on Friday, will this year see 2,871 shows performed by 24,107 artists in 273 venues across Scotland's capital city.

It is easy to assume the Fringe is all about comedy. Or at least, focused on fun and frivolity.

But this year, there's been a drop in comedy (from 36% to 33%) and there's a marked increase in the number of theatre shows - from 751 to 824. Among them, some of the most gritty real subject matters the festival has ever tackled. (...)

The Lockerbie Bomber raises questions about the events leading up to the explosion of Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988. [RB: And questions about the conviction of Abdelbaset Megrahi for bombing the aircraft.] Playwright Alan Clark has staged the play elsewhere - it will be performed in Malta later this year - but he says it was important to bring it to the fringe.

"I've got two hopes. One is that it makes compelling theatre and that it makes people think again about what happened that terrible night. 25 years on we still don't know what happened.

"What we do know is that there's been a cover up and sooner or later I hope the truth will come out and that my play in a very small way helps that come about."

Laidback, lethargic and over-confident in their own infallibility

[A report in today’s edition of The Herald contains the following:]

The controversy over the Lockerbie bombing and the conviction of former Libyan spy Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi is set to be raised significantly later this year when relatives hold a 25th anniversary memorial service at Westminster Abbey.

Jim Swire, who lost his 23-year-old daughter Flora in Britain's worst terrorist atrocity, is one of the relatives behind the move, which could see several hundred people paying their respects to the 270 victims of the tragedy at the service on December 21 in London.

The 76-year-old GP, who has been at the forefront of the relatives' campaign for justice, signalled that after 25 years he would be handing the leading role in the relatives' campaign for justice to someone else.

He did not elaborate, but said: "If the authorities can't get their heads around the fact that we require the truth after 25 years, then they have had long enough. I intend to take more of a backseat role."

Dr Swire said there would be other significant supporters of the families' campaign for justice, who would take the lead and "expose the fact that the evidence against Megrahi was nonsense".

He pointed to two pieces in particular which made the case against the late Libyan spy invalid – a fake circuit board used at the trial and information about a break-in at Heathrow the day before the terrorist atrocity.

Allegations, which include claims that prosecutors passed false information to the court and key statements were deliberately buried, are now being investigated by Patrick Shearer, the former Dumfries and Galloway Chief Constable.

Dr Swire accused the Crown Office of being "too laidback, lethargic and over-confident in their own infallibility", saying the implications of someone planting fake evidence were "terrible; I feel most angry about it".

He explained: "After 25 years, we wanted to have another memorial event. It's not about the Crown Office or Scottish justice, although they will have to justify things sooner or later. This is not just an issue for the relatives, but for the people of Scotland."

A spokesman for the Crown Office said: "We have no comment to make on Dr Swire's personal views. The evidence gathered by the police and prosecutors was rigorously tested at the trial and two appeals against conviction. At the end of this lengthy process the conviction still stands.

"The investigation into the others who acted with Megrahi in the bombing of Pan Am 103 remains live.

"Given recent events in Libya and the change in regime, there is the possibility of future criminal proceedings."

Fact or fiction?: James Robertson and Lockerbie

[This is the headline over a review in today’s edition of the Scottish Review by Andrew Hook, Bradley Professor of English Literature in the University of Glasgow from 1979 to 1998.  It reads in part:]

James Robertson's bold and extraordinary new novel – The Professor of Truth – has already sparked controversy. Hardly surprising given that its prime subject matter involves the most controversial episode in the modern history of Scottish justice: the conviction and imprisonment of the late Abdelbaset al-Megrahi as the terrorist responsible for the destruction of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie in December, 1988.

Robertson sticks closely to the circumstances and characters involved in the Lockerbie tragedy and its aftermath, but what he has written remains a novel, a work of fiction. The book's central character is closely based on that of Jim Swire, the English doctor who lost his daughter on Flight 103, but who has subsequently become celebrated for his public and outspoken rejection of the validity of the trial and conviction of Megrahi. Dr Swire here becomes Alan Tealing, a lecturer – significantly not a professor – in the Stirling University department of English literature. He has lost his wife as well as his daughter in the disaster. Likewise Megrahi has become Khalil Khazar.

In the first section of the novel, entitled 'Ice', the setting remains a wintry Scotland, and Robertson creates a full and moving imaginative account of Tealing's response to the loss of his family and the existential freezing of his life and experience that follows. But in the book's second and final section – called 'Fire' – the scene shifts to a wholly imaginary experience of Australia where Tealing tracks down a Maltese character called Parroulet, clearly based on the real-life Maltese clothes shop owner, Tony Gauci, whose evidence was crucial in the trial and conviction of Megrahi.

Given this context, the novel inevitably raises a series of familiar quasi-philosophical questions: about the relationship between life as it is lived and how it is depicted in a work of art, about fiction and reality – not to mention others about how far the ideals of truth and justice actually operate in the practice of the law, and the validity of realistic or idealistic visions of human experience. So much so that one reviewer has referred to the Scottish section of the novel as a 'tutorial' on such issues. Perhaps there is a potential problem here for the novelist, but to my mind at least, the particulars of Alan Tealing's predicament, which we never lose sight of, prevent any descent into mere abstraction. Issues surrounding the meaning of truth and justice have come to define Tealing's life.

Another reviewer – Alexander Linklater in The Observer – raises a more central issue. He argues that the book is at its best when it is most fictional: it 'feels most real at the points where it is clearly fictional'. I agree. Again and again James Robertson’s creative imagination provides the tiny, telling detail which confirms the human reality of what is being described. Over the years, Tealing's relations with his wife's family in America slowly deteriorate. They cannot understand his rejection of the court's verdict. Their phone calls become infrequent; they have less and less to say to each other. 'When we spoke', Tealing tells us, 'I pictured the ocean rolling between us, vast and grey and cold'. (...)

For Linklater, the problem stems from Robertson's over-commitment to the truth and accuracy of Swire's rejection of the Scottish court's verdict. In his view the novel would have been more satisfying had Tealing been less sure that, say, Parroulet's withdrawing or qualifying his original evidence would lead to 'Khazar's' acquittal. In fact, Tealing is frequently shown struggling with doubt over the usefulness and value of his total commitment over so many years to the pursuit of the truth behind what he calls 'The Case'. Like the governess in Henry James's The Turn of the Screw, he is even ready to entertain – momentarily – the horror of his being entirely wrong.

What is actually in question here is a larger issue. Linklater's position (or preference) is very much a current, postmodern one. Contemporary art in all its forms prefers the uncertain, the problematic, the unresolved, the fragment. For the majority of today's artists there are no finalities, no absolutes, no firm or unchallengeable truths of any kind. But when in 1898 Emile Zola took on the French legal and political establishment with the publication of J'Accuse, a man – Alfred Dreyfus – was in prison for a crime he did not commit. A great wrong existed which could and should be righted. Eight years later, it was.

Writing The Professor of Truth, even if he chooses not to challenge the Scottish legal establishment head-on, James Robertson is clearly on Zola's side. Will the Lockerbie story be a different one eight years from now? 

[Because of popular demand, a second event involving James Robertson has been arranged at the 2013 Edinburgh International Book Festival. The programme states: "We are delighted to announce that James Robertson, one of Scotland’s foremost literary talents, will appear at a second event at the Book Festival.

"Tickets for his first event on 18 August sold out swiftly so anyone who was unable to secure tickets can now take the opportunity to see the novelist on Friday 23 August at 12 noon. Tickets are on sale now here on the website or you can ring our Box Office on 0845 373 5888."]

In search of truth

[This is the heading over a letter from Iain McKie published in today’s edition of The Scotsman.  It reads as follows:]

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe consistently surprises, delights and sometimes disappoints, but without it our culture would be poorer and a powerful medium for political expression would be lost to the people of Scotland.

While entertaining, the Fringe, as part of this remit, has a duty to challenge the status quo and make us ponder on issues of the day.

This year two major issues, the ongoing independence debate and the [21 December 25th] anniversary of the Lockerbie Pan Am bombing, are tackled in The Lockerbie Bomber, a new play presented by Falkirk’s Tryst Theatre Company.

Dramatic, insightful and superbly acted and presented, it forces us to remember and reflect on the greatest terrorist outrage ever committed in the UK.

It is also a reminder that despite the human suffering and the political expressions of outrage, governments, including ours in Scotland, have procrastinated, dissembled and protected the guilty by placing their own interests above those of the victims, their families and friends and the people of Scotland.

The play challenges the viewer to consider how an independent Scotland can ever be a stronger and better country when our politicians cannot “independently” work to resolve what has become “Scotland’s shame”.

The Lockerbie Bomber has lived in my memory and challenged me, a supporter of independence, to reflect on whether an independent Scotland would lead to a more just society or sadly just more of the same.

The irony that the play is showing in C Venues in Chambers Street, the very home of the Crown Office, that immovable barrier to the truth about Lockerbie, will not be lost on those of us who seek truth and justice.

Playwright flays Scottish Government over Lockerbie

[What follows is the text of a press release:]

The writer of a new play about the Lockerbie bombing being premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe on Wednesday believes First Minister Alex Salmond’s handling of the atrocity is undermining Scotland’s bid for independence.

Alan Clark’s new play, The Lockerbie Bomber, deals with the crash and its aftermath.

He said: “I suspect a number of Scots would on balance vote for independence but what’s stopping them is the failure of the SNP Government to act independently on Lockerbie and mount an inquiry.

“As the play asks: what’s the point of independence if injustice is allowed to prosper and the Crown Office is permitted to win the day? Is this the fairer, better nation we’ve been promised by the “Yes” campaign?

“How can the First Minister present Scotland as a respected, ethical nation about to take its place on the world stage when the justice system he presides over is reminiscent of a banana republic – when at the Lockerbie Kamp Zeist trial, it’s alleged that crucial evidence was suppressed, that evidence was fabricated, that a witness was paid millions for his testimony and that members of the prosecution team perverted the course of justice?

“I believe it makes Scotland look a laughing stock on the world stage.

“I agree with former MP Tam Dalyell who said last year: “The SNP Government - and Alex Salmond and Kenny MacAskill in particular - are burying their heads in the sand on the Lockerbie issue. If they were to admit that Mr Megrahi had nothing to do with the crime of Lockerbie, they would then by implication condemn the very institution which shows Scotland to be most separate from England – the justice system.”

Clark, from Falkirk, added: “I was a student at St Andrews University at the same time as Mr Salmond and in general I've admired him since then. But on Lockerbie I believe he needs to be brave and show leadership by casting the Crown Office adrift and abandoning the fiction that Megrahi’s conviction is safe - otherwise he risks looking weak and indecisive.”

The Lockerbie Bomber is on at C venues in Chambers Street in Edinburgh from July 31 to August 13 at 12 noon daily.

"Dirty dealing" by UK Government over Megrahi prisoner transfer agreement

[An article in today’s edition of The Sunday Telegraph discloses that the UK Government linked its conclusion of a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya to an arms-export deal.  It reads in part:]

An email sent by the then British ambassador in Tripoli details how a prisoner transfer agreement would be signed once Libya “fulfils its promise” to buy an air defence system.

The disclosure is embarrassing for members of the then Labour government, which always insisted that Abdelbaset al-Megrahi’s release was not linked to commercial deals.

The email, which contained a briefing on the UK’s relations with Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s regime, was sent on June 8 2008 by Sir Vincent Fean, the then UK ambassador, to Tony Blair’s private office, ahead of a visit soon after he stepped down as prime minister.

Mr Blair flew to Tripoli to meet Gaddafi on June 10, in a private jet provided by the dictator, one of at least six visits Mr Blair made to Libya after quitting Downing Street.

The briefing, which runs to 1,300 words, contains revealing details about how keen Britain was to do deals with Gaddafi. It also suggests that:

Þ the UK made it a key objective for Libya to invest its £80 billion sovereign wealth fund through the City of London

Þ the UK was privately critical of then President George Bush for “shooting the US in the foot” by continuing to put a block on Libyan assets in America, in the process scuppering business deals

Þ the Department for International Development was eager to use another Libyan fund worth £130 million to pay for schemes in Sierra Leone and other poverty-stricken countries.

The release of Megrahi in August 2009 caused a huge furore, with the Government insisting he had been released on compassionate grounds because he was suffering from terminal cancer, and that the decision was taken solely by the Scottish government. (...)

Libya had been putting pressure on the UK to release Megrahi and in May 2007, just before he left Downing Street, Mr Blair travelled to Sirte to meet Gaddafi and Al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi, Libya’s then prime minister.

At that meeting, according to Sir Vincent’s email, Mr Blair and Mr Baghdadi agreed that Libya would buy the missile defence system from MBDA, a weapons manufacturer part-owned by BAE Systems. The pair also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for a prisoner transfer agreement (PTA), which the Libyans believed would pave the way for Megrahi’s release.

The British government initially intended the agreement to explicitly exclude Megrahi. However, ministers relented under pressure from Libya.

In December 2007, Jack Straw, then justice secretary, told his Scottish counterpart that he had been unable to secure an exclusion, but said any application to transfer Megrahi under the agreement would still have to be signed off by Scottish ministers.

With Mr Blair returning a year later — as a guest of Gaddafi on his private jet — the government appears to have used the chance to press its case for the arms deal to be sealed. At the time, Britain was on the brink of an economic and banking crisis, and Libya, through the Libyan Investment Authority, had billions of pounds in reserves.

Sir Vincent wrote: “There is one bilateral issue which I hope TB [Tony Blair] can raise, as a legacy issue. On 29 May 07 in Sirte, he and Libya’s PM agreed that Libya would buy an air defence system (Jernas) from the UK (MBDA). One year on, MBDA are now back in Tripoli (since 8 June) aiming to agree and sign the contract now — worth £400 million, and up to 2,000 jobs in the UK. (...)

“Linked (by Libya) is the issue of the 4 bilateral Justice agreements about which TB signed an MoU with Baghdadi on 29 May. The MoU says they will be negotiated within the year: they have been. They are all ready for signature in London as soon as Libya fulfils its promise on Jernas.”

The PTA was signed in November 2008 by Bill Rammell, a foreign office minister.

The disclosure of the email, which was obtained by The Sunday Telegraph as a result of a Freedom of Information request, angered the relatives of victims of the bombing.

Pam Dix, whose brother Peter died at Lockerbie, said: “It appears from this email that the British government was making a clear correlation between arms dealing with Libya and the signing of the prisoner transfer agreement.

“We were told Megrahi’s release was a matter strictly for the Scottish government but this shows the dirty dealing that was going on behind the scenes.”

Lord Mandelson, who was business secretary when Megrahi was released, said he was unaware of any possible links between commercial deals and negotiations over a release.

He said: “Based on the information that I was given at the time, I made clear the government’s position. I was not aware of the correspondence covered in this FOI request.”

Forthcoming Lockerbie-related events

There is still time to go over the sea to Skye to hear James Robertson and Jim Swire at 7pm tonight in the Skye Book Festival at the Aros Centre in Portree.

Other Lockerbie-related events in the near future include the following Edinburgh Festival Fringe productions:

Lockerbie: Lost Voices:

Scottish Storytelling Centre: Venue 30a

43-45 High Street, Edinburgh EH1 1SR

Previews: Wed 31 July & Thurs 1 August 7pm (1 hour)

2-6, 8-13, 15-20, 22-26 August, 7pm (1 hour)

Venue Box Office: 0131 556 9579

and

The Lockerbie Bomber:

Nugget Theatre Company

C Venues in Chambers Street, Edinburgh

July 31-August 13 daily at 12 noon.

Fringe Box Office: 0131 226 0000 | www.edfringe.com

What was thought about responsibility for Lockerbie in mid-1989

[I have just this morning discovered online a fascinating (and very long) profile of and interview with Colonel Gaddafi by T D Allman published in the July 1989 issue of Vanity Fair. On page 2 (of eight) it contains the following:]

It was here that Qaddafi burst out, saying that the Arabs also “must own, possess, nuclear weapons.” He quickly went on to tell me that he expected President Hosni Mubarak to be overthrown, and Egypt to repudiate its peace with Israel at “any moment.” He also ridiculed efforts by the Palestine Liberation Organization to negotiate with Israel. “The Palestinians are not Yasser Arafat, and what you call the PLO is not a fact,” he assured me.

Who are the Palestinians’ true leaders? Qaddafi singled out for praise and support Abu Musa, the renegade Palestinian commando leader who has consistently attempted to harden Israeli opposition to any peace concessions through attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers; Ahmad Jabril and his Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command; and the Fatah Revolutionary Council, better known as the Abu Nidal Organization.

Nidal’s operations have included the September 1986 attack on an Istanbul synagogue, in which twenty-two mostly elderly Jewish worshipers were killed, and the December 1985 attacks on the Rome and Vienna airports— lauded by Libya as “heroic” actions—in which sixteen civilians, including a child, died. More recently, the same organization has kidnapped, among other foreign civilians, a pregnant French woman who, with her newborn infant, is still in captivity, as well as her two young daughters, whose release Qaddafi helped to arrange. As for Jabril’s group, it is believed to have been involved in the December 1988 bombing of a Pan Am jetliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, in which 270 persons, including 189 Americans, were killed.

The Helsinki warning

[An article headed Administrative notice was published yesterday by Lisa Parrish on the blog The Great Whatsit.  It deals with the infamous Helsinki warning and includes a copy of the notice to personnel posted in the Moscow embassy of the USA on 13 December 1988. The article reads in part:]

Here is the full text:

To:  All Embassy Employees

Subject:  Threat to Civil Aviation

Post has been notified by the Federal Aviation Administration that on December 5, 1988, an unidentified individual telephoned a U.S. diplomatic facility in Europe and stated that sometime within the next two weeks there would be a bombing attempt against a Pan American aircraft flying from Frankfurt to the United States.

The FAA reports that the reliability of the information cannot be assessed a this point, but the appropriate police authorities have been notified and are pursuing the matter. Pan Am has also been notified.

In view of the lack of confirmation of this information, post leaves to the discretion of individual travelers any decisions on altering personal travel plans or changing to another American carrier. This does not absolve the traveler from flying an American carrier.

Eight days later, on December 21, 1988, a Pan Am flight that originated in Frankfurt, then passed through Heathrow en route to New York’s JFK airport, exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew. The flight was bombed by Libyan nationals.

What’s remarkable about this in retrospect is that the US State Department chose to alert its employees in Moscow and Helsinki, but the FAA issued no broader alert to the public about this very specific threat. The existence of this memo is not a secret – it’s covered here, with some disconcerting additional details – so I’m not adding some new conspiracy-theory wrinkle to the story by posting it here.

I clearly must have held on to the memo because of the Lockerbie crash, but I don’t recall feeling outraged at the time that there had been no broader alert. And even today, I honestly wonder how much the government would, or should, reveal about such warnings. Alerting people to avoid a particular carrier’s flights could result in severe economic consequences for that airline – but should that matter if lives are at stake? Is the only humane response to send out widespread alerts, even if they create consternation and fear? Or would that be succumbing to the very “terror” that terrorists intend to foment?

[The best treatment of the Helsinki warning that I am aware of is to be found here and here on Caustic Logic’s blog The Lockerbie Divide.]