[This is the headline over a letter from David Flett published in today’s edition of The Scotsman. It reads as follows:]
The revelation that the SNP sought Donald Trump’s public approval of the release of Megrahi (your report, 9 October) paints a sad picture of today’s PR-obsessed political arena.
Spin doctoring, media manipulation and concealment of uncomfortable truths far outweigh integrity, honesty and justice.
Meanwhile, in the court of common sense, 270 murders remain unsolved, while these same deceptive politicians avoid the politically inconvenient process of initiating a public inquiry into the whole Lockerbie atrocity.
The two key pillars of Megrahi’s conviction have been thoroughly and publicly discredited. Through the work of journalists, investigators and those who simply had a genuine interest in uncovering the truth, we have found out that evidence relating to Tony Gauci and the circuit board fragment with the wrong coating should not have been admissible in court.
Yet, in August 2009, as Megrahi’s appeal neared its successful completion, our backroom politicians kicked swiftly into full crisis manipulation mode.
With expert conniving, manoeuvring and a small dose of clandestine blackmail, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi (despite maintaining his innocence) drops his appeal and is allowed to fly home.
So here we are, 24 years after Scotland’s biggest ever crime, stuck with a vanity-fixated government, ineffectual justice system and a deceived group of bereaved relatives.
Alex Salmond has the power and opportunity here to do something statesman-like and assist to dispel the obscurities surrounding Lockerbie.
Will he leave us all in the darkness with secret e-mails, or will he help shine a light on the truth by starting a public
inquiry?
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Donald Trump. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Donald Trump. Sort by date Show all posts
Wednesday 10 October 2012
Tuesday 7 January 2020
Has President Rouhani acknowledged Iran's responsibility for Lockerbie?
[What follows is excerpted from a report in today's edition of the Daily Express:]
Donald Trump has been warned to expect another Lockerbie by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, as Iran continued to mourn the death of its top military leader Qassem Soleimani.
Mr Rouhani responded to the US President’s threat to strike 52 Iranian sites, by posting a cryptic tweet in which he told America to never threaten Iran and to “remember the number 290”. He wrote: “Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290.#IR655. Never threaten the Iranian nation.”
The figure 290 refers to the total number of passengers on Iranian Airways flight IR655 who died when their plane was accidentally shot down over the Persian Gulf by the US Navy in July 1988.
In December of the same year, Pan Am flight 103 crashed in Lockerbie after a bomb exploded on board, killing all 270 passengers.
Although Colonel Gaddafi and Libya were blamed for the terrorist attack, Western intelligence agencies believed that Iran ordered the bombing in retaliation for the downing of its plane in July.
Mr Rouhani’s post has been interpreted by some Middle East experts as a veiled reference to the Lockerbie tragedy and an implicit acknowledgement of their involvement in the affair.
Fatima Alasrar, a Middle East analyst from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, linked Rouhani's tweet with the Lockerbie disaster.
She wrote: “Rouhani is basically reminding @realDonaldTrump of the #Iranian Air Flight 655 carrying 290 passengers which was downed by a US navy warship the Vincennes in 1988.
“Though it was deemed a human error, Tehran worked covertly to exact its revenge. How? #Lockerbie.”
She added: 'Boeing 747 airline Pan Am exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988 and was assumed to be an operation conducted by the Libyans when it was #Iran who orchestrated the downing of the plane and paid the Libyans to do it.
“After years of denying, Rouhani just admitted to it!”
[RB: A longer article along the same lines appears today in the Daily Mail. In February 2016 barrister David Wolchover wrote an article setting out the evidence for Iran and Rouhani's responsibility for Lockerbie.]
Donald Trump has been warned to expect another Lockerbie by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, as Iran continued to mourn the death of its top military leader Qassem Soleimani.
Mr Rouhani responded to the US President’s threat to strike 52 Iranian sites, by posting a cryptic tweet in which he told America to never threaten Iran and to “remember the number 290”. He wrote: “Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290.#IR655. Never threaten the Iranian nation.”
The figure 290 refers to the total number of passengers on Iranian Airways flight IR655 who died when their plane was accidentally shot down over the Persian Gulf by the US Navy in July 1988.
In December of the same year, Pan Am flight 103 crashed in Lockerbie after a bomb exploded on board, killing all 270 passengers.
Although Colonel Gaddafi and Libya were blamed for the terrorist attack, Western intelligence agencies believed that Iran ordered the bombing in retaliation for the downing of its plane in July.
Mr Rouhani’s post has been interpreted by some Middle East experts as a veiled reference to the Lockerbie tragedy and an implicit acknowledgement of their involvement in the affair.
Fatima Alasrar, a Middle East analyst from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, linked Rouhani's tweet with the Lockerbie disaster.
She wrote: “Rouhani is basically reminding @realDonaldTrump of the #Iranian Air Flight 655 carrying 290 passengers which was downed by a US navy warship the Vincennes in 1988.
“Though it was deemed a human error, Tehran worked covertly to exact its revenge. How? #Lockerbie.”
She added: 'Boeing 747 airline Pan Am exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988 and was assumed to be an operation conducted by the Libyans when it was #Iran who orchestrated the downing of the plane and paid the Libyans to do it.
“After years of denying, Rouhani just admitted to it!”
[RB: A longer article along the same lines appears today in the Daily Mail. In February 2016 barrister David Wolchover wrote an article setting out the evidence for Iran and Rouhani's responsibility for Lockerbie.]
Friday 10 January 2020
Innocence of Megrahi and Libya does not point to guilt of Iran
[What follows is excerpted from an article by Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer published today on his Intel Today website, where full supporting citations can be found:]
On January 6 2020, President Hassan Rouhani tweeted the following message:
“Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655. Never threaten the Iranian nation.”
This tweet was a response to President Donald Trump’s threat to target 52 sites in Iran should it retaliate against the US drone strike that killed top Iranian military figure General Qassem Soleimani on January 3 2020.
Not surprisingly, Rouhani’s message was quickly commented on by Middle East and Lockerbie experts as well as by imbeciles and hypocrites.
Real experts —
Middle East analyst Fatima Alasrar, from the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, was one of the first to indicate the link between Rouhani’s tweet and Lockerbie.
“Rouhani is basically reminding @realDonaldTrump of the #Iranian Air Flight 655 carrying 290 passengers which was downed by a US navy warship the Vincennes in 1988.
Though it was deemed a human error, Tehran worked covertly to exact its revenge.
How? Lockerbie.”
Robert Black — Professor Emeritus of Scots Law in the University of Edinburgh and best known as the architect of the Lockerbie Trial– concurs.
Speaking to The National as Iran continued to mourn Soleimani, Black said:
“I think Rouhani’s tweet does refer to Pan Am 103 … The 290 clearly refers to those killed on Iran Air 655 and with ‘Never threaten the Iranian nation’ it seems to me that he’s saying that Iran responded to those Iranian deaths caused by US action.
The only response that I can think of was the bombing of Pan Am 103 six months later.”
Imbeciles and hypocrites —
Given half a chance, idiots will never miss the opportunity to share with you their “deep knowledge” on sensitive issues. The current Iran Crisis is a case in point.
Describing himself as an expert on terrorism strategy with 36 years of services in the US Intel Community, Malcolm Nance tweeted:
“PANAM 103 was DEFINATELY Qaddafi Libya. We found the same Swiss digital detonators were purchased by Libyan intelligence and were also used on the UTA 772 in flight bombing. No question. Iran had nothing to do with it.”
Here is a quick primer for this “expert”. Firstly, no detonators were recovered, let alone identified, among the debris of PA 103 and UTA 772.
Secondly, the timer that allegedly triggered the bomb on UTA 772 was produced in Taiwan, not Switzerland.
Thirdly, we know now that PT/35(b) — a fragment of an PCB allegedly found at Lockerbie — does NOT match the metallurgy of the Swiss timers — MST13 — delivered to Libya. Full stop. (...)
Intel Today analysis —
There is no doubt whatsoever that Rouhani makes a direct reference to the 290 victims of Iranian Air Flight 655.
His warning “Never threaten the Iranian nation” appears to be a veiled threat suggesting that Iran will retaliate for Soleimani’s assassination just like they did in the case of Iranian Air Flight 655.
Assuming that this is indeed what Rouhani means, then it seems logical to conclude that he is claiming Iran’s responsibility for the downing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie.
Actually, it is not the first time that a high level Iranian cleric claims responsibility for Lockerbie.
Indeed, when I spoke to Bani Sadr — who served as the first president of the Republic of Iran — he told me that ayatollah Motashemi-pur had immediately taken credit for the Lockerbie bombing which he regarded as a “just revenge” for Flight 655.
However…
Let me say this one more time. There is no doubt whatsoever that the Lockerbie verdict is utter nonsense.
Megrahi — the man known as the Lockerbie bomber — clearly suffered a spectacular miscarriage of justice.
In fact, the analysis of the fragment that linked Libya to Lockerbie demonstrates that the Swiss timers delivered to Libya played no role in the tragedy.
This is, in my opinion, the only reasonable conclusion that an honest person can reach.
However, to many observers, the innocence of Megrahi — and Libya — can only point to the guilt of Iran.
I can not agree with such a flawed logic, for it may very well replace a 30 years old lie by a new one, which would be quite convenient to certain groups today as it would suit very well their geopolitical agenda. (...)
Let me make this point very clear. There is not a shred of evidence that Iran ordered the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie as an act of retaliation for Iran Air 655.
And there is a good reason for that which I will reveal today.
In the aftermath of Flight 655 disaster, the US and Iran conducted a series of secret talks in the city of Montreux, Switzerland. Richard Lawless was representing Bush and Abolghasem Mesbahi was an envoy of Rafsanjani.
By the end of September 1988 — 3 months before Lockerbie — they managed to settle an agreement.
None of this has ever been made public for obvious reasons. It would have been perceived as a second IranGate scandal. (...)
So, what really happened?
The Lockerbie investigation underwent three separated stages. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the American and British investigators quickly identified the cause of the tragedy as well as those responsible for it.
However, both Bush and Thatcher agreed that the truth was inconvenient.
From early January 1989 to March 1989, US and UK Intelligence agencies were busy writing a script implicating Iran.
That was not a very difficult task considering that very realistic but false “means, motive, and opportunity” could easily be wowen into a rather believable story.
Basically, the events of the “Autumn Leaves” operation — the PFLP-GC cell operating in Frankfurt — became a blueprint for the script. Thus all the key items appear at this stage: brown Samsonite, clothes from Malta, Toshiba radio, Semtex, Frankfurt, etc…
But in March 1989, George H W Bush and Margaret Thatcher decided to hold off this game plan.
Why? Remember that the US is in secret talks with Rafsanjani and the future seems promising.
Ayatollah Khomeini is dying and his hardliner heir — Grand Ayatollah Montazeri — has been sacked on March 26 1989.
Khomeini died on June 3rd 1989. Ali Khamenei was elevated from the position of hojatoleslām to the rank of Ayatollah.That title, and a modification of the Constitution which previously restricted the job to the few people such Montazeri who had the title of Grand Ayatollah, was then enough to promote him as Khomeini’s successor.
Next, Rafsanjani himself was elected Iran’s president on August 3rd 1989.
By September 1989, blaming Iran for Lockerbie would no longer have served the geopolitical interests of the US and UK.
And lo and behold, in September 1989, the investigation entered stage 3 and switched away from Iran to solely focus on Libya thanks to the mysterious ‘discovery’ of a tiny circuit board known as PT/35(b). The rest is History. (...)
If the SCCRC recommend a new trial, the infamous Zeist verdict does not have a snowball’s chance in hell of surviving.
This should be the very top priority. Once Megrahi is acquitted and the Lockerbie-Libya fiction is erased once and for all, then the time will be right to investigate the true cause of disaster and reveal the identity of the culprits. It is not very hard at all…
On January 6 2020, President Hassan Rouhani tweeted the following message:
“Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655. Never threaten the Iranian nation.”
This tweet was a response to President Donald Trump’s threat to target 52 sites in Iran should it retaliate against the US drone strike that killed top Iranian military figure General Qassem Soleimani on January 3 2020.
Not surprisingly, Rouhani’s message was quickly commented on by Middle East and Lockerbie experts as well as by imbeciles and hypocrites.
Real experts —
Middle East analyst Fatima Alasrar, from the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, was one of the first to indicate the link between Rouhani’s tweet and Lockerbie.
“Rouhani is basically reminding @realDonaldTrump of the #Iranian Air Flight 655 carrying 290 passengers which was downed by a US navy warship the Vincennes in 1988.
Though it was deemed a human error, Tehran worked covertly to exact its revenge.
How? Lockerbie.”
Robert Black — Professor Emeritus of Scots Law in the University of Edinburgh and best known as the architect of the Lockerbie Trial– concurs.
Speaking to The National as Iran continued to mourn Soleimani, Black said:
“I think Rouhani’s tweet does refer to Pan Am 103 … The 290 clearly refers to those killed on Iran Air 655 and with ‘Never threaten the Iranian nation’ it seems to me that he’s saying that Iran responded to those Iranian deaths caused by US action.
The only response that I can think of was the bombing of Pan Am 103 six months later.”
Imbeciles and hypocrites —
Given half a chance, idiots will never miss the opportunity to share with you their “deep knowledge” on sensitive issues. The current Iran Crisis is a case in point.
Describing himself as an expert on terrorism strategy with 36 years of services in the US Intel Community, Malcolm Nance tweeted:
“PANAM 103 was DEFINATELY Qaddafi Libya. We found the same Swiss digital detonators were purchased by Libyan intelligence and were also used on the UTA 772 in flight bombing. No question. Iran had nothing to do with it.”
Here is a quick primer for this “expert”. Firstly, no detonators were recovered, let alone identified, among the debris of PA 103 and UTA 772.
Secondly, the timer that allegedly triggered the bomb on UTA 772 was produced in Taiwan, not Switzerland.
Thirdly, we know now that PT/35(b) — a fragment of an PCB allegedly found at Lockerbie — does NOT match the metallurgy of the Swiss timers — MST13 — delivered to Libya. Full stop. (...)
Intel Today analysis —
There is no doubt whatsoever that Rouhani makes a direct reference to the 290 victims of Iranian Air Flight 655.
His warning “Never threaten the Iranian nation” appears to be a veiled threat suggesting that Iran will retaliate for Soleimani’s assassination just like they did in the case of Iranian Air Flight 655.
Assuming that this is indeed what Rouhani means, then it seems logical to conclude that he is claiming Iran’s responsibility for the downing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie.
Actually, it is not the first time that a high level Iranian cleric claims responsibility for Lockerbie.
Indeed, when I spoke to Bani Sadr — who served as the first president of the Republic of Iran — he told me that ayatollah Motashemi-pur had immediately taken credit for the Lockerbie bombing which he regarded as a “just revenge” for Flight 655.
However…
Let me say this one more time. There is no doubt whatsoever that the Lockerbie verdict is utter nonsense.
Megrahi — the man known as the Lockerbie bomber — clearly suffered a spectacular miscarriage of justice.
In fact, the analysis of the fragment that linked Libya to Lockerbie demonstrates that the Swiss timers delivered to Libya played no role in the tragedy.
This is, in my opinion, the only reasonable conclusion that an honest person can reach.
However, to many observers, the innocence of Megrahi — and Libya — can only point to the guilt of Iran.
I can not agree with such a flawed logic, for it may very well replace a 30 years old lie by a new one, which would be quite convenient to certain groups today as it would suit very well their geopolitical agenda. (...)
Let me make this point very clear. There is not a shred of evidence that Iran ordered the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie as an act of retaliation for Iran Air 655.
And there is a good reason for that which I will reveal today.
In the aftermath of Flight 655 disaster, the US and Iran conducted a series of secret talks in the city of Montreux, Switzerland. Richard Lawless was representing Bush and Abolghasem Mesbahi was an envoy of Rafsanjani.
By the end of September 1988 — 3 months before Lockerbie — they managed to settle an agreement.
None of this has ever been made public for obvious reasons. It would have been perceived as a second IranGate scandal. (...)
So, what really happened?
The Lockerbie investigation underwent three separated stages. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the American and British investigators quickly identified the cause of the tragedy as well as those responsible for it.
However, both Bush and Thatcher agreed that the truth was inconvenient.
From early January 1989 to March 1989, US and UK Intelligence agencies were busy writing a script implicating Iran.
That was not a very difficult task considering that very realistic but false “means, motive, and opportunity” could easily be wowen into a rather believable story.
Basically, the events of the “Autumn Leaves” operation — the PFLP-GC cell operating in Frankfurt — became a blueprint for the script. Thus all the key items appear at this stage: brown Samsonite, clothes from Malta, Toshiba radio, Semtex, Frankfurt, etc…
But in March 1989, George H W Bush and Margaret Thatcher decided to hold off this game plan.
Why? Remember that the US is in secret talks with Rafsanjani and the future seems promising.
Ayatollah Khomeini is dying and his hardliner heir — Grand Ayatollah Montazeri — has been sacked on March 26 1989.
Khomeini died on June 3rd 1989. Ali Khamenei was elevated from the position of hojatoleslām to the rank of Ayatollah.That title, and a modification of the Constitution which previously restricted the job to the few people such Montazeri who had the title of Grand Ayatollah, was then enough to promote him as Khomeini’s successor.
Next, Rafsanjani himself was elected Iran’s president on August 3rd 1989.
By September 1989, blaming Iran for Lockerbie would no longer have served the geopolitical interests of the US and UK.
And lo and behold, in September 1989, the investigation entered stage 3 and switched away from Iran to solely focus on Libya thanks to the mysterious ‘discovery’ of a tiny circuit board known as PT/35(b). The rest is History. (...)
If the SCCRC recommend a new trial, the infamous Zeist verdict does not have a snowball’s chance in hell of surviving.
This should be the very top priority. Once Megrahi is acquitted and the Lockerbie-Libya fiction is erased once and for all, then the time will be right to investigate the true cause of disaster and reveal the identity of the culprits. It is not very hard at all…
Sunday 12 January 2020
"All the evidence points to Iran, including the words of its own president"
[The following is excerpted from an article by Marcello Mega headlined Bereaved father: Rouhani tweet is Lockerbie admission in today's edition of The Sunday Times:]
More than 31 years after his daughter was murdered in the Lockerbie bombing, Dr Jim Swire has condemned Police Scotland and the Crown Office for refusing to investigate a “confession” tweeted by Iran’s president.
Hassan Rouhani used his Twitter account last week to warn the West: “Never threaten the Iranian nation.”
He also referred to the 290 people killed on an Iran Air flight on July 3, 1988, less than six months before the Lockerbie bombing, when IR655 was shot down over the Gulf by a US warship, USS Vincennes.
At the time, Iran warned that the skies would run with the blood of Americans.
Investigators were building a case against Iran for most of the first year of the investigation into the Lockerbie bombing, which claimed the lives of 270 people. But changes in the region’s geopolitical relations with the West coincided with a shift in focus to Libya, and the late Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, a Libyan agent, remains the only person convicted of the bombing.
Swire and some other relatives of the Lockerbie victims have never accepted Libya’s guilt, and Megrahi’s own family currently has a Scottish lawyer pursuing a posthumous appeal through the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission.
After the US air strike that killed Iranian military commander General Qasem Soleimani earlier this month, Donald Trump stoked tensions by referring to 52 further potential targets in Iran. Rouhani responded: “Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290.”
Swire said last night: “It’s been 31 years. There has been claim and counterclaim, but never before has anyone come this close to confessing responsibility.
“Of course, those who want to maintain the farce that Libya was responsible will suggest other explanations, but there are none.
“The president of Iran is saying that they avenged the deaths of the 290 killed on IR655. There is no other incident, no act of aggression by Iran, that could explain that claim, only Lockerbie.”
Police Scotland and the Crown Office maintained that all ongoing investigations were still directed at Libya, provoking Swire’s anger.
Swire said: “I am now 83 and my chances of seeing justice done for Flora and the 269 others who died diminish with every year that passes.
“I used to believe in Scottish justice. I promised Megrahi and Libya that he would have a fair trial under Scots law and I regret that very much because he was convicted on no basis in fact.
“It was a show trial, and they are now continuing the farce by concentrating on Libya when all the evidence points to Iran, including the words of its own president.”
He was also highly critical of the outcome of Operation Sandwood in which a high-level team of Police Scotland investigators spent years probing allegations made by pressure group Justice for Megrahi that prosecutors, police officers and crown experts had committed criminal acts during Megrahi’s trial.
To ensure independence from the crown, police took direction from an independent advocate — who has never been identified — and concluded in 2018 that there had been no criminality.
A Crown Office spokesman said: “This is a live inquiry and Scottish prosecutors have a number of strands of investigation which are producing intelligence and information supportive of the original trial court’s finding.” (...)
Rouhani did not reply to a tweet asking whether his tweet was a confession to the Lockerbie bombing. Nor did the Iranian embassy in London respond.
[RB: An editorial in today's edition of The Sun contains the following:]
Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was one of the 270 people who perished, believes Iran has come close to confessing to the bombing in a cryptic tweet.
We don’t know if Dr Swire is correct or not in his claims.
But it’s vital the ongoing inquiry into the bombing gives all leads proper consideration.
Dr Swire — and the other relatives — deserve no less.
More than 31 years after his daughter was murdered in the Lockerbie bombing, Dr Jim Swire has condemned Police Scotland and the Crown Office for refusing to investigate a “confession” tweeted by Iran’s president.
Hassan Rouhani used his Twitter account last week to warn the West: “Never threaten the Iranian nation.”
He also referred to the 290 people killed on an Iran Air flight on July 3, 1988, less than six months before the Lockerbie bombing, when IR655 was shot down over the Gulf by a US warship, USS Vincennes.
At the time, Iran warned that the skies would run with the blood of Americans.
Investigators were building a case against Iran for most of the first year of the investigation into the Lockerbie bombing, which claimed the lives of 270 people. But changes in the region’s geopolitical relations with the West coincided with a shift in focus to Libya, and the late Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, a Libyan agent, remains the only person convicted of the bombing.
Swire and some other relatives of the Lockerbie victims have never accepted Libya’s guilt, and Megrahi’s own family currently has a Scottish lawyer pursuing a posthumous appeal through the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission.
After the US air strike that killed Iranian military commander General Qasem Soleimani earlier this month, Donald Trump stoked tensions by referring to 52 further potential targets in Iran. Rouhani responded: “Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290.”
Swire said last night: “It’s been 31 years. There has been claim and counterclaim, but never before has anyone come this close to confessing responsibility.
“Of course, those who want to maintain the farce that Libya was responsible will suggest other explanations, but there are none.
“The president of Iran is saying that they avenged the deaths of the 290 killed on IR655. There is no other incident, no act of aggression by Iran, that could explain that claim, only Lockerbie.”
Police Scotland and the Crown Office maintained that all ongoing investigations were still directed at Libya, provoking Swire’s anger.
Swire said: “I am now 83 and my chances of seeing justice done for Flora and the 269 others who died diminish with every year that passes.
“I used to believe in Scottish justice. I promised Megrahi and Libya that he would have a fair trial under Scots law and I regret that very much because he was convicted on no basis in fact.
“It was a show trial, and they are now continuing the farce by concentrating on Libya when all the evidence points to Iran, including the words of its own president.”
He was also highly critical of the outcome of Operation Sandwood in which a high-level team of Police Scotland investigators spent years probing allegations made by pressure group Justice for Megrahi that prosecutors, police officers and crown experts had committed criminal acts during Megrahi’s trial.
To ensure independence from the crown, police took direction from an independent advocate — who has never been identified — and concluded in 2018 that there had been no criminality.
A Crown Office spokesman said: “This is a live inquiry and Scottish prosecutors have a number of strands of investigation which are producing intelligence and information supportive of the original trial court’s finding.” (...)
Rouhani did not reply to a tweet asking whether his tweet was a confession to the Lockerbie bombing. Nor did the Iranian embassy in London respond.
[RB: An editorial in today's edition of The Sun contains the following:]
Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was one of the 270 people who perished, believes Iran has come close to confessing to the bombing in a cryptic tweet.
We don’t know if Dr Swire is correct or not in his claims.
But it’s vital the ongoing inquiry into the bombing gives all leads proper consideration.
Dr Swire — and the other relatives — deserve no less.
Tuesday 29 November 2022
Libyan tribe urges Prime Minister to release Lockerbie suspect
[What follows is excerpted from a report published yesterday on the Libya Review website:]
The tribe of the Libyan officer, who was previously linked to the Lockerbie case, has called on the Prime Minister of the Government of National Unity (GNU), Abdel-Hamid Dbaiba to “intervene immediately to release him, without restrictions or conditions.”
The Maraima tribe demanded in a statement that Dbaiba “not involve the name of Abu Ajila Masoud in the Lockerbie case again.”
The tribe called for “the release of Abu Ajila after he was kidnapped by an unknown party on the background of the Lockerbie case.” It held the kidnapping party “legally and morally responsible,” and urged “the tribes and the Libyan people to work for Abu Ajila’s release.”
Earlier this month, the Libyan National Security Adviser, Ibrahim Bushnaf warned against deliberately raising the issue of the Lockerbie Case.
In press remarks on Friday, Bushnaf warned that if the Lockerbie case was raised again and criminal investigations were conducted, Libya would enter into decades of lawlessness. (...) Bushnaf’s statements came amid current allegations that Libya could hand over Abu Ajila. Local media reported that Abu Ajila was “kidnapped” by government-affiliated forces, and likely he will be handed over to the US.
“Before US President Donald Trump left the White House, the then US Attorney General, William Barr, raised the (Lockerbie) case. At that time, reports alleged that Barr was calling on the Libyan authorities to extradite Abu Ajila,” Bushnaf said.
On 6 February 2021, Libyan Foreign Minister, Najla Al-Mangoush expressed her willingness to cooperate with the United States to extradite Abu Ajila. She quickly retracted her statements, claiming that she “did not mention that text,” and that she was answering a question about the Lockerbie case.
[An article yesterday on The Reference website contains the following:]
The file of the downing of a passenger plane over Lockerbie in Scotland continues to haunt Libyan authorities.
This is especially true with the (...) Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh government planning to extradite the last defendant in the case to the United States.
Washington had repeatedly called for this extradition, even as Libya had paid tens of billions of dollars in compensation under late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Some Libyans are warning, meanwhile, against reopening the file of the plane.
This, they say, may force Libya to pay new compensation for the families of the victims of the plane downing.
The last defendant in the case, Bouajila Massoud, was kidnapped from his home in Tripoli by militias affiliated with Abdul Ghani al-Kakli [more commonly "Kikli"], a military commander loyal to the Dbeibeh government.
Massoud's kidnappers escorted him to an unknown location.
This development caused widespread anger, and several warnings against reopening this file, which may lead to forcing Libya to pay new compensation to the families of the victims and their countries.
Despite calls for disclosing the place where Massoud is kept and his release, the authorities in Tripoli did not make any response.
They only ruled out plans to negotiate over the Lockerbie file again.
Massoud, a former Libyan intelligence officer, was imprisoned after the downfall of the Gaddafi regime.
He was convicted on charges unrelated to the Lockerbie issue.
Friday 15 January 2021
Megrahi appeal dismissed
The High Court has dismissed the posthumous appeal brought on behalf of Abdelbaset Megrahi. The 64-page opinion of the court can be read here. [RB: In the version originally issued, the date of the disaster was stated by the court to be 22 December 1988, the same blunder as was made in the trial court's judgement. This has since been corrected to 21 December. Careless.] A summary can be found here.
As regards the first ground of appeal, the court concludes in paragraph 87 that, notwithstanding evidence challenging 7 December 1988 as the date of purchase of the items from Tony Gauci's shop, and notwithstanding concerns about the evidence supporting Gauci's "identification" of Megrahi, "... the contention that the trial court reached a verdict that no reasonable court could have reached is rejected. On the evidence at trial, a reasonable jury, properly directed, would have been entitled to return a guilty verdict."
As regards the ground of appeal founding upon failure by the Crown to disclose material that would have been helpful to the defence the court concludes that even if the material had been disclosed it would not have made a difference to the guilty verdict. Paragraph 135 of the opinion reads: "The contention that the Crown failed to disclose material which would have created a real prospect of a different verdict is rejected."
The outcome of the appeal is a cogent illustration of just how difficult it is to have the Scottish criminal justice system acknowledge that a mistake has been made, as I continue to believe has happened here. It is, I contend, a matter of grave public concern, that the appeal was so narrowly confined and that issues such as the metallurgy of the circuit board fragment and Dr Morag Kerr's findings regarding the loading of the bomb suitcase at Heathrow were not ventilated.
The Herald's report on the dismissal of the appeal contains the following statement from the Megrahi family's solicitor, Aamer Anwar:
"Ali Al-Megrahi the son of the only man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing said his family were left heart broken by the decision of the Scottish courts, he maintained his father’s innocence and is determined to fulfil the promise he made to clear his name and that of Libya.
"As of this morning the Megrahi family have instructed our legal team to appeal to the UK Supreme Court [and] we will lodge an application within 14 days.
"The family demand the release of secret evidence held by the UK Government, which they believe incriminates others such as Iran and the Syrian-Palestinian group, the Foreign Secretary had refused to do so, this must happen for the truth to emerge."
[What follows is excerpted from a press release issued today by Aamer Anwar:]
Significant material has been received by the Legal team over the last several months, but especially since the announcement by Donald Trump’s former Attorney General William Barr on 21 December 2020, where he stated that the USA wished to extradite a former Libyan Intelligence Officer, Abu Agila Mohammad Masud for the Lockerbie bombing, 32 years later.
Masud’s confession to being involved in the conspiracy with Al-Megrahi to blow up Pan Am Flight 103, was supposedly ‘extracted’ by a ‘Libyan law enforcement agent’ in 2012, whilst in custody in a Libyan Prison. No new information appeared to be presented by Attorney General Barr.
What was significant in the US criminal complaint against Masud was his claim that he bought the clothes to put into the Samsonite suitcase that is claimed went on to blow up Pan Am Flight 103.
Of course, the problem for the US Department of Justice is that the case against Megrahi is still based on the eye-witness testimony of Toni Gauci stating that Megrahi bought the clothes. How can both men be held responsible?
The al-Megrahi family believe that if the conviction against their father were to be overturned then the US case against Masud would be non-existent.
Undoubtedly there will now be huge pressure on Libya and the GNA, the Government of National Accord based in Tripoli to extradite Abu Agila Masud to the US, but of course the American authorities will be also aware that if the Megrahi’s were to be successful at the Supreme Court, then so called case against Abu Masud would crumble.
A reversal of the verdict would have meant that the governments of the United States and the United Kingdom stand exposed as having lived a monumental lie for 32 years, imprisoning a man they knew to be innocent and punishing the Libyan people for a crime which they did not commit.
All the Megrahi family want for Scotland is peace and justice, but as Ali stated today their journey is not over, Libya has suffered enough, as has family for the crime of Lockerbie, they remain determined to fight for justice.
They are grateful to their legal team for their unwavering commitment and also to the British families for their compassion and search for justice.
Ali said God willing, he will visit his father's grave one day to tell him that justice was done and that he fulfilled his promise to clear his name and that of Libya.
In this appeal the legal arguments related to two distinct challenges to the conviction. The first was that it was contended that no reasonable jury properly directed could have convicted Mr Megrahi on the evidence led, focusing in particular on the evidence of Maltese shopkeeper Tony Gauci stating that Megrahi bought clothes from him that were ultimately placed into a suitcase containing the bomb planted on the plane.
The second ground was that the failure to disclose information to the defence, led to the trial being unfair and thus a miscarriage of justice, these related to the reliability of Mr Gauci’s identification of Megrahi as the person who bought the clothes, as well as the content of CIA cables.
In relation to the second ground of appeal, the failure to disclose information to the defence, the decision of the Appeal Court is the determination of a “compatibility issue” – an issue arising from a question relating to the breach of human rights, in this case article 6 the right to a fair trial.
Where the Appeal Court in Scotland determines a compatibility issue, it is competent to seek leave to appeal from the Appeal Court of the determination of that issue to the UK Supreme Court in London. If leave to appeal by the Scottish courts is refused, it is competent to seek leave to appeal directly from the Supreme Court in London.
... the Megrahi family have instructed us to make an application to the UK Supreme Court. We must now lodge an application within 14 days. Today’s decision will be carefully considered and intimated to the Crown and the UK Advocate General and lodged with the Justiciary Clerk with 14 days of the opinion of the court which is dated 15th January 2021.
The Justiciary Clerk will then ask for written submissions. The Crown is allowed to lodge submissions to object. Written submissions are always required even if there is an oral hearing. It may be that the court will advise that the matter will be considered on paper submissions only.
The time for a decision on that application is difficult to estimate, however we would expect the al-Megrahi case to progress relatively quickly and no longer than 2-3 months.
When the decision of the High Court of Justiciary is known - if it is an adverse decision then within 28 days an application for 'permission to appeal' can be lodged with the UKSC Registrar to directly appeal to the Supreme Court. One would hope that if such a process were followed then the appeal would be heard before the end of 2021.
Wednesday 28 June 2017
‘‘We brought in the CIA... the Scots… MI5”
[What follows is excerpted from a long article headlined How Donald Trump Misunderstood the FBI that was published yesterday in The New York Times Magazine:]
Born into a wealthy family, Mueller exemplified ‘‘the tradition of the ‘muscular Christian’ that came out of the English public-school world of the 19th century,’’ Maxwell King, Mueller’s classmate at St Paul’s, the elite New England prep school, told me. Mueller arrived at FBI headquarters with a distinguished military record — he earned a bronze star as a Marine in Vietnam — and years of service as a United States attorney and Justice Department official. It was a week before the Sept 11 attacks, and he was inheriting an agency ill suited for the mission that would soon loom enormously before it. Richard A Clarke, the White House counterterrorism czar under Clinton and Bush, later wrote that [Louis] Freeh’s FBI had not done enough to seek out foreign terrorists. Clarke also wrote that Freeh’s counterterror chief, Dale Watson, had told him: ‘‘We have to smash the FBI into bits and rebuild it.’’
Mueller had already earned the respect of the FBI rank and file during his tenure as chief of the criminal division of the Justice Department. When he started work at the Justice Department in 1990, the FBI had been trying and failing for two years to solve the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. ‘‘The FBI was not set up to deal with a major investigation like this,’’ Richard Marquise, an FBI intelligence analyst who became the leader of the Lockerbie investigation under Mueller, said in an FBI oral history. ‘‘I blame the institution.’’
Mueller used his power under law to obliterate the FBI’s byzantine flow charts of authority in the case. ‘‘We literally cut out the chains of command,’’ Marquise said. ‘‘We brought in the CIA. We brought the Scots. We brought MI5 to Washington. And we sat down and we said: ‘We need to change the way we’re doing business.... We need to start sharing information.’ ’’ It was a tip from the Scots that put Marquise on the trail of the eventual suspect: one of Col Muammar el-Qaddafi’s intelligence officers, whose cover was security chief for the Libyan state airlines. Qaddafi’s spy, Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, was indicted in 1991. It took until the turn of the 21st century, but he was convicted.
It meant a great deal to Mueller, in the Lockerbie case, that the evidence the FBI produced be deployed as evidence in court, not justification for war. In a speech he gave at Stanford University in 2002, concerning the nation’s newest threat, he spoke of ‘‘the balance we must strike to protect our national security and our civil liberties as we address the threat of terrorism.’’ He concluded: ‘‘We will be judged by history, not just on how we disrupt and deter terrorism, but also on how we protect the civil liberties and the constitutional rights of all Americans, including those Americans who wish us ill. We must do both of these things, and we must do them exceptionally well.’’
Monday 19 July 2010
Government must block US interference
[This is the heading over a letter by Tom Minogue published in today's edition of The Scotsman. It reads in part:]
Many of the huge number of online commentators on Eddie Barnes' article (17 July) were incensed by the possibility that Scotland's justice minister might be summoned to Washington to explain his decision to release Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds.
I was dismayed, but not surprised at the stance taken by the US as it is in keeping with the history of the Lockerbie trial.
Back in 2001 the United Nations-appointed independent observer to the trial at the Scots court in [the Netherlands], Professor Hans Koechler, voiced his serious concerns that senior US Justice Department officials were in the body of the court and appeared to be directing the Crown Office prosecution staff. (...)
Scotland has a history of subservient over-eagerness to do our American cousin's bidding - Alex Salmond's fawning over Donald Trump, for example - and if the Yanks were allowed to run the show at the Lockerbie trial, then it shouldn't surprise anyone if they attempt to interfere further in that saga by summoning our justice minister as if they were ordering a taxi.
If our legal system and officials have been tarnished by Lockerbie, then there is one redeeming aspect of the sorry affair and that is the fact that at long last one Scots lawyer, MSP Christine Grahame, has had the courage to point out that the Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission (SCCRC) found that there was serious doubt as to the safety of Megrahi's conviction - something that Salmond, McAskill, and Lord Advocate Elish Angiolini have studiously avoided mentioning.
Mrs Grahame is also calling for the US to take part in a full inquiry into all of the circumstances surrounding the Lockerbie trial. Good for her. She typifies the best qualities of our nation: independent and brave; telling it like it is, without fear of our powerful neighbour across the pond, or of her bosses at Holyrood.
I fear that her doubts about Megrahi's trial and conviction, like those of the UN observer and the SCCRC, will not be taken seriously by the powers that be.
[The four readers' letters on the subject published in today's edition of The Herald are also worth reading.]
Many of the huge number of online commentators on Eddie Barnes' article (17 July) were incensed by the possibility that Scotland's justice minister might be summoned to Washington to explain his decision to release Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds.
I was dismayed, but not surprised at the stance taken by the US as it is in keeping with the history of the Lockerbie trial.
Back in 2001 the United Nations-appointed independent observer to the trial at the Scots court in [the Netherlands], Professor Hans Koechler, voiced his serious concerns that senior US Justice Department officials were in the body of the court and appeared to be directing the Crown Office prosecution staff. (...)
Scotland has a history of subservient over-eagerness to do our American cousin's bidding - Alex Salmond's fawning over Donald Trump, for example - and if the Yanks were allowed to run the show at the Lockerbie trial, then it shouldn't surprise anyone if they attempt to interfere further in that saga by summoning our justice minister as if they were ordering a taxi.
If our legal system and officials have been tarnished by Lockerbie, then there is one redeeming aspect of the sorry affair and that is the fact that at long last one Scots lawyer, MSP Christine Grahame, has had the courage to point out that the Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission (SCCRC) found that there was serious doubt as to the safety of Megrahi's conviction - something that Salmond, McAskill, and Lord Advocate Elish Angiolini have studiously avoided mentioning.
Mrs Grahame is also calling for the US to take part in a full inquiry into all of the circumstances surrounding the Lockerbie trial. Good for her. She typifies the best qualities of our nation: independent and brave; telling it like it is, without fear of our powerful neighbour across the pond, or of her bosses at Holyrood.
I fear that her doubts about Megrahi's trial and conviction, like those of the UN observer and the SCCRC, will not be taken seriously by the powers that be.
[The four readers' letters on the subject published in today's edition of The Herald are also worth reading.]
Friday 23 December 2022
Libya aborted plan to hand Gaddafi spy chief to US at last minute
[This is the headline over a report in today's edition of The Guardian. It reads in part:]
Extradition of Abdullah al-Senussi over Lockerbie bombing would have closely followed that of Mohammed Abouagela Masud
The extradition to the US of Muammar Gaddafi’s most trusted and notorious aide was abruptly halted by Libya at the 11th hour this week for fear of public anger after the handover of another ex-senior Libyan intelligence operative, officials in Tripoli have told the Guardian.
Abdullah al-Senussi, a former intelligence chief and brother-in-law of Gaddafi, is blamed for a series of lethal bombings directed at western aviation as well as other targets.
The US want the 72-year-old, currently held in prison in Tripoli, to answer questions connected to the attack which brought down a US-bound aircraft over Lockerbie in Scotland in 1988. Senussi has long been suspected of masterminding the operation, which killed 270 people.
Earlier this month the US announced that another Libyan suspect in the Lockerbie bombing, Mohammed Abouagela Masud, was in its custody. Masud was taken from his Tripoli home by armed men on 17 November, held for two weeks by a militia and then handed over to US government agents in the port city of Misrata.
His family said he had been unlawfully abducted. In a statement on Tuesday, the US embassy in Libya said the process had been “lawful and conducted in cooperation with Libyan authorities”.
The handover of Masud has provoked outrage in Libya, putting the government of interim prime minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibeh under severe pressure and leading to the shelving of plans to transfer Senussi to US custody.
“The idea was to have Masud sent to the US first and then give them Senussi. There have been discussions for months about this. But then officials got worried,” said one Libyan official source with knowledge of the case. A second said Senussi was meant to be handed over at the weekend.
Known as “the butcher”, Senussi is being held in the Rawawa prison in Tripoli and is thought to be in ill health. He was sentenced to death in a mass trial that concluded in 2015.
Senussi was considered Gaddafi’s most trusted aide. (...)
The effort to secure the transfer of Masud and Senussi was launched under Donald Trump’s administration but has been revived over the last nine months through discussions between US officials and the Libyan government, the sources said.
In August an agreement about the transfer of Senussi and Masud was reached with Dbeibeh. Dbeibeh’s mandate expired last December and he has a clear incentive to win favour with the US, analysts say.
As Senussi is currently behind bars, a transfer by Libya to the US would have been administratively more straightforward than that of Masud, who was detained without a warrant by militia loyal to a commander accused of systematic human rights abuses.
“This is a completely different case,” said one Libyan official.
Senussi is also a widely reviled figure in Libya, and cannot be portrayed as a pawn simply following orders, as Masud has been by his supporters.
In the early 1980s, while Senussi ran Gaddafi’s internal security services, many opponents of the regime were killed in Libya and overseas. Libyans hold him responsible for the 1996 massacre of about 1,200 inmates at the Abu Salim prison while a court in France convicted him in absentia in 1999 for his role in the 1989 bombing of a passenger plane over Niger that killed 170 people.
Senussi, then head of Libya’s external security organisation, has long been accused of recruiting and managing Abdel-Baset al-Megrahi, the man convicted of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing. (...) [RB: In August 2011 The Wall Street Journal published a letter from Megrahi to Senussi that was found in the latter's archives after the fall of the Gaddafi regime. Megrahi wrote "I am an innocent man" and blamed his conviction on "fraudulent information that was relayed to investigators by Libyan collaborators".]
Successive Libyan governments insisted on prosecuting Senussi on home soil. The ICC decided in 2013 that as Libya had put Senussi on trial it would halt its own proceedings against him. The former intelligence chief was eventually condemned to death in July 2015 in a process that was severely criticised by human rights campaigners.
It is unclear if the transfer of Senussi to the US has been shelved indefinitely, or merely postponed.
Alia Brahimi, an expert on Libya with the Atlantic Council, said the case demonstrated a tension between the demands of the law and the demands of justice.
“Senussi is suspected of a great many crimes and the possibility that he might answer for one of them, an act of mass murder no less, is extraordinary,” Brahimi said. “Any transfer would generate enormous controversy, whatever the circumstances, as did that of Masud, and rightly so. But the lasting story will be about the long arm of American justice, and it will be heard around the world.
“Successive transitional governments [in Libya] have struggled to hold members of the old regime accountable in a transparent and ordered way, because of the chaos which has prevailed since the revolution but also because of the continuing power of regime interest groups.”
The family of Senussi and tribes still loyal to him have threatened unrest if he is transferred to the US.
Saturday 19 November 2022
Libyan official warns against raising the Lockerbie issue
[This is the headline over a report published today on the Trend Detail News website. It reads in part:]
Ibrahim Bushnaf, the Libyan National Security Adviser, warned against deliberately raising the issue of the Pan Am 103 plane that crashed over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988, and said that this issue “if it was raised again and became the subject of a criminal investigation, Libya would enter into decades of lawlessness. Only God knows its end.”
This warning comes amid current allegations that there is a [move] inside the country to hand over the Libyan citizen Abu Ajila Masoud, who is suspected of participating in the bombing of the plane, to the Americans, but [these] allegations remain against the backdrop of a political division between the two fronts in western and eastern Libya.
On February 6, 2021, statements were attributed to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the interim “unity” government, Najla al-Manqoush, in which she expressed her cooperation with the possibility of her country working with the United States to extradite Abu Ajila, but she quickly retracted it at the time, and said that she “did not mention that text.” But she was answering a question about the Lockerbie case.
Bushnaf said, in a statement today (Friday), that “before US President Donald Trump left the White House, the Attorney General during his reign, William Barr, raised the (Lockerbie) case, what was reported at the time that he was calling on the Libyan authorities to extradite the Libyan citizen Abu Aguila Masoud, allegedly related to this case.
Bushnaf said, “Because we are aware of the details of the agreement that ended the conflict with the United States, we formed a legal and political team at the time, affiliated with the office of the Libyan Minister of Interior at the time, to follow up on the developments of the request.”
He explained: “The basis for the work of this team is that the Libyan state at the time of the previous regime insisted that the basis of the settlement is limited only to its civil liability for the actions of its subordinates without criminal liability. The settlement also included that any claims after the date of signing are directed to the United States government.”
Bushnaf pointed out that “statements attributed to the Minister of Foreign Affairs circulated last year on this issue, so the Prime Minister (Abdul Hamid al-Dabaiba) addressed us with a [text] that did not deviate from the content of this speech.”
Bushnaq went on to warn against raising the Lockerbie issue, calling on “all patriots and political entities in the country to line up to prevent this, away from the political conflict.”
And in December 2021, the US Department of Justice had previously charged the Libyan, Abu Ageila, with his “involvement in planning and manufacturing the bomb” that brought down the plane over Lockerbie during its flight from London to New York, killing 270 people, including 189 Americans.
At the time, William Barr demanded that the Libyan authorities in Tripoli quickly extradite Abu Ageila, who is under arrest, to be brought to trial in the United States. US officials said that Abu Ageila made confessions to the Libyan authorities in 2012 of his involvement in the Lockerbie bombing, and that these confessions were handed over to the Scottish authorities.
Abu Ageila is a former Libyan intelligence official, who is currently being held in a prison in the capital, Tripoli, on charges not related to the Lockerbie case. In 2003, Muammar Gaddafi’s regime officially acknowledged its responsibility for the Lockerbie attack and agreed to pay $2.7 billion in compensation to the families of the victims. Al-Megrahi, who was sentenced to 27 years, was released for health reasons in 2009, but he died in 2012 at the age of 60 in Libya. [RB: What Libya acknowledged was "responsibility for the acts of its officials". The regime did not admit that it had ordered the bombing: http://lockerbiecase.blogspot.com/2008/08/libyan-august-2003-acceptance-of.html]
The Libyan intelligence officer, Abd al-Basit al-Megrahi, was considered the main suspect in the bombing of the plane, and he was sentenced to 27 years in prison, but he was released in 2009 after he was diagnosed with the last stage of prostate cancer. Following an indication from the Daily Mail newspaper that Iran might be involved in the case, al-Megrahi’s family demanded compensation for the period he spent in prison, while several parallel demands arose in Libyan cities, talking about “the possibility of recovering the compensation paid by Muammar Gaddafi’s regime to the families of the Lockerbie victims.”
Wednesday 7 February 2018
US won’t disclose fate of $500 million paid by Libya for Lockerbie bombing victims
[This is the headline over a report published yesterday on the Breitbart
News website. It reads in part:]
The US government refuses to say whether it will keep or return the estimated $500 million that remains from the $1.5 billion Libya-sponsored fund intended to compensate American victims of terrorism following the 1988 attack on Pan American World Airways Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a US State Department official acknowledged that the US government paid some of this money to victims of other terrorist attacks, not just Lockerbie. Libya’s government was linked to the assault on the Pan-Am aircraft.
In a statement to Breitbart News, the State official said:
The US government refuses to say whether it will keep or return the estimated $500 million that remains from the $1.5 billion Libya-sponsored fund intended to compensate American victims of terrorism following the 1988 attack on Pan American World Airways Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, a US State Department official acknowledged that the US government paid some of this money to victims of other terrorist attacks, not just Lockerbie. Libya’s government was linked to the assault on the Pan-Am aircraft.
In a statement to Breitbart News, the State official said:
Shortly after the [$1.5 billion] settlement was received [from Libya], the State Department paid amounts to the PanAm 103 victims, LaBelle Disco bombing victims, and estates of victims who had died in other terrorist attacks that were the subject of litigation pending against Libya in US courts These payments amounted to over $1 billion.
According to State, about $500 million remained in the fund. Public data online shows that the US government has only awarded an estimated $37.7 million, indicating that much larger portion of the $1.5 billion is leftover.
Asked whether the US government will keep the leftover funds or return the money to Libya, US President Donald Trump’s administration would not say.
“In the event there are any residual balances in the Fund Account at the time of the Fund’s expiration, those balances will be transferred pursuant to arrangements agreed between the parties,” noted the 2008 US-Libya settlement of $1.5 billion awarded by the African country.US government officials declined to tell Breitbart News what the “agreed arrangements” are.
The settlement agreement dictates that the $1.5 billion is intended to compensate US victims of “an act of torture, extrajudicial killing, aircraft sabotage, hostage taking or detention or other terrorist act, or the provision of material support or resources for such an act; or by military measures” at the hands of Libya.
Under former US President Barack Obama, the American government issued compensation referrals for individuals who were not affected by Lockerbie “because there were some remaining settlement funds,” acknowledged the State official, noting that the same thing happened under former President George W Bush.
The US Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Foreign Claims Settlement Commission (FCSC) is charged with deciding who gets the Libya funds.
FCSC officials recently denied a request by about 50 former Pan Am pilots to recover $46.5 million ($75.3 million with interest) from the Libya-subsidized funds. Whether $500 million or more remains in the Libya-sponsored fund, there is definitely enough money to cover the Pan-Am pilots’ claim.
The pilots, many of them senior citizens now who served in the US military, have argued that the Lockerbie attack prompted the demise of Pan Am, which resulted in them losing their jobs and pensions.
However, FCSC officials contended that the Lockerbie incident did not lead to PanAm’s demise and therefore had nothing to do with the pilots losing their jobs.
Asked whether the US government will keep the leftover funds or return the money to Libya, US President Donald Trump’s administration would not say.
“In the event there are any residual balances in the Fund Account at the time of the Fund’s expiration, those balances will be transferred pursuant to arrangements agreed between the parties,” noted the 2008 US-Libya settlement of $1.5 billion awarded by the African country.US government officials declined to tell Breitbart News what the “agreed arrangements” are.
The settlement agreement dictates that the $1.5 billion is intended to compensate US victims of “an act of torture, extrajudicial killing, aircraft sabotage, hostage taking or detention or other terrorist act, or the provision of material support or resources for such an act; or by military measures” at the hands of Libya.
Under former US President Barack Obama, the American government issued compensation referrals for individuals who were not affected by Lockerbie “because there were some remaining settlement funds,” acknowledged the State official, noting that the same thing happened under former President George W Bush.
The US Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Foreign Claims Settlement Commission (FCSC) is charged with deciding who gets the Libya funds.
FCSC officials recently denied a request by about 50 former Pan Am pilots to recover $46.5 million ($75.3 million with interest) from the Libya-subsidized funds. Whether $500 million or more remains in the Libya-sponsored fund, there is definitely enough money to cover the Pan-Am pilots’ claim.
The pilots, many of them senior citizens now who served in the US military, have argued that the Lockerbie attack prompted the demise of Pan Am, which resulted in them losing their jobs and pensions.
However, FCSC officials contended that the Lockerbie incident did not lead to PanAm’s demise and therefore had nothing to do with the pilots losing their jobs.
Tuesday 18 November 2014
Alex Salmond and the release of Abdelbaset Megrahi
[A number of media organisations in their reflections on Alex Salmond’s tenure of office as First Minister on his last full day, refer to the release on compassionate grounds of Abdelbaset Megrahi. Here is an example from today’s edition of The Daily Telegraph:]
The Scottish Government’s decision to release the man convicted of Britain’s worst mass murder prompted revulsion and criticism from around the world, especially when he was given a hero’s welcome in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, complete with a crowd waving Scottish flags.
Although the decision was ostensibly made by Kenny MacAskill, the Scottish Justice Minister, Salmond’s involvement was shown later by a series of letters in which he lobbied figures such as Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu and Donald Trump to publicly support it.
The bomber was released on compassionate grounds as he supposedly had less than three months to live but ended up living nearly three years, prompting further fury from some of the families of his victims.
[If the release decision was overwhelmingly unpopular overseas (by which is meant the United States) the same cannot be said of domestic public opinion. What follows is from an item posted on this blog on 4 September 2009:]
Almost half of all Scots now support Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill's controversial decision to release the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing in a dramatic shift in public opinion.
The YouGov poll of 1556 people found 45% thought Mr MacAskill made the right call to free Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi last month on compassionate grounds. The same percentage said he was wrong.
[And the following poll results from Scottish local newspapers is taken from an item posted on this blog on 31 August 2009:]
Those For first number, those Against second number
Dumfries & Galloway Standard 88.4% 11.6%
Annandale Observer 73% 27% (Lockerbie paper)
Perthshire Advertiser 90.6% 8.4%
Ross-shire Journal 87% 13%
Scotsman 58% 42%
Lennox Herald 80.5% 19.5%
Oban Times 89% 11%
Kilmarnock Standard 72.5% 28.5%
East Kilbride News 71% 29%
West Lothian Courier 75.2% 24.8%
Hamilton Advertiser 60.3% 39.7%
Airdrie Advertiser 56.1% 43.9%
Wishaw Press 83% 17%
Paisley Daily Express 62.23% 37.7%
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