President Mandela's October 1997 visit to Libya

[What follows is the text of a Reuters news agency report from 23 October 1997:]

South African President Nelson Mandela, sternly dismissing US reservations about his mission, arrived in Libya on Wednesday for a visit described by diplomats as the most important for Muammar Gaddafi since the United Nations clamped sanctions on his nation in 1992.

Mandela, his Mozambican companion, Graca Machel, and Foreign Minister Alfred Nzo arrived at the Libyan border town of Ras Adjir by helicopter from the nearby Tunisian resort island of Djerba and drove across the frontier and 160 km (100 miles) to Tripoli. The trip was made by road because of an air embargo imposed on Libya by the United Nations.

Mandela's 50-vehicle convoy passed under a series of welcoming banners, including one that set the tone for his visit saying: "Mandela's visit to Libya is a devastating blow to America."

After a triumphant cavalcade around downtown Tripoli, Mandela, 79, was greeted by Gaddafi outside the ruined home in which the Libya leader's daughter, Hana, was brutally killed in a US air raid more than 10 years ago.

Greeting Gaddafi with a hug and a kiss on each cheek, Mandela told him: "My brother leader, my brother leader. How nice to see you."

Shortly afterwards, he told reporters he remained unimpressed by US opposition to his mission, adding:"Those who say I should not be here are without morals. I am not going to join them in their lack of morality."

Mandela said he had spent 27 years in jail rather than abandon his principles under pressure and said he felt the same way about his debt to Gaddafi and the Libyan people for their support in the struggle against apartheid.

"This man helped us at a time when we were all alone, when those who say we should not come here were helping the enemy (South Africa's white government)," Mandela said.

He reiterated South Africa's policy on the sanctions imposed by the United Nations to force Libya to hand over two suspects in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland -- saying a way should be found to lift them.

Mandela said South Africa supported the Organisation of African unity's call for a trial in a neutral third country.

He said he would seek to promote a resolution of the stalemate between Libya and the United States and Britain at the Commonwealth summit in Edinburgh next week.

"It would be premature now to say exactly how we are going to search for a solution. (We) feel that to maintain these sanctions is to punish the ordinary people of Libya and that is why there is now great concern that the remaining sanctions must be lifted," he said.

Diplomats in Tunisia said Mandela was Gaddafi's most significant guest since the UN banned air travel to the North African state. "Colonel Gaddafi receives a regular stream of African leaders in Tripoli, but it would be fair to say that with his international stature, Mr Mandela is the most significant visitor he has received since 1992," said an African diplomat. The United States has branded Libya a terrorist state and, in line with its policy of discouraging trade or diplomatic relations, on Monday renewed its objection to Mandela's visit. "We would be disappointed if he decided to make such a trip. To give (the Libyans) any solace at a time like this would be unfortunate," said US State Department spokesman James Rubin.

Ebrahim Saley, South Africa's ambassador to Tunisia and Libya, told Reuters, however, Libya had offered Mandela's ANC consistent moral support throughout the 30-year armed struggle against white rule in South Africa, including training and financial backing that helped the party to sweep apartheid into history.

Mandela visited Libya twice between his release from jail in 1990 and his election as South Africa's first black leader in 1994, but has not been to Tripoli since becoming president.

Abdalla Abzubedi, Libya's ambassador to South Africa, told Reuters the visit would focus on regional peace-making efforts and bilateral trade. Asked whether the Lockerbie issue could be raised, he said: "President Mandela always makes a difference to any international issue - especially in Africa."

Straw denies Megrahi release was connected to trade deals

[This is the headline over an article in Monday's edition of The Herald. It reads in part:]

Jack Straw, the UK Justice Secretary, has described as "absurd" suggestions that trade deals had anything to do with the release of the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing.

Mr Straw was forced into the denial after letters leaked to a Sunday newspaper appeared to show that he had backed away from efforts to stipulate that Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi should be exempt from a prisoner transfer agreement signed with Libya in 2007.

His comments were made as the father of one of the victims of the bombing of Pan Am 103 said it was time "to stop mulling over the why and wherefore of Megrahi’s release" and Nelson Mandela sent a letter of support to the Scottish Government. (...)

Mr Straw said: "The implication that, somehow or other, we have done some back-door deal in order to release Mr Megrahi is simply nonsense.

"What makes this whole debate absurd now is that Mr Megrahi was not released under the prisoner transfer agreement."

Mr Straw admitted that in return for Libya abandoning its nuclear weapons programme there were moves to "establish wider relations including trade", but added: "the suggestion that at any stage there was some kind of back-door deal done over Mr Megrahi’s transfer because of trade is simply untrue". (...)

Nelson Mandela played a central role in facilitating the handover of Megrahi to the United Nations so he could stand trial under Scottish law in the Netherlands, and subsequently visited him in Barlinnie Prison in Glasgow.

His backing emerged in a letter sent by Professor Jake Gerwel, chairperson of the Mandela Foundation.

He said: "Mr Mandela sincerely appreciates the decision to release Mr al Megrahi on compassionate grounds.

"His interest and involvement continued after the trial after visiting Mr al Megrahi in prison.

"The decision to release him now, and allow him to return to Libya, is one which is therefore in line with his wishes."

Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was killed in the atrocity, called on the authorities in Scotland to "take responsibility" for reviewing Megrahi’s conviction.

In a letter to the media, Dr Swire said he was "delighted" that Megrahi, who has terminal prostate cancer, had been freed.

He said: "Let us stop mulling over the why and wherefore of Megrahi’s release.

"The public’s knowledge of the shifty dealings surrounding the prisoner transfer agreement should help to swell demand for objective assessment of the Megrahi case."

[Notes by RB:

1. It is disingenuous in the extreme for Jack Straw to claim that the debate over a deal between the UK and Libyan Governments over Abdelbaset Megrahi is absurd because he was in fact repatriated, not under the prisoner transfer agreement, but through compassionate release.

The memorandum of understanding regarding prisoner transfer that Tony Blair entered into in the course of the "deal in the desert" (and which paved the way for the formal prisoner transfer agreement) was intended by both sides to lead to the rapid return of Mr Megrahi to his homeland. This was the clear understanding of Libyan officials involved in the negotiations and to whom I have spoken.

It was only after the memorandum of understanding was concluded that Downing Street and the Foreign Office belatedly realised that the decision on repatriation of this particular prisoner was a matter not for Westminster and Whitehall but for the devolved Scottish Government in Edinburgh -- and that government had just come into the hands of the Scottish National Party and so could no longer be expected supinely to follow the UK Labour Government's wishes. That was when the understanding between the UK Government and the Libyan Government started to unravel, to the considerable annoyance and distress of the Libyans, who had been led to believe that repatriation under the PTA was only months away.

2. The letter from Dr Swire that is referred to in The Herald's article reads as follows:]

Lockerbie: the truth must be known

Before the Lockerbie trial, brokered by Nelson Mandela, had begun, I believed that it would reveal the guilt of the two Libyans in the murder of my daughter and all those others.

I have always believed that we should look for how something of benefit to the world could be somehow squeezed out of the appalling spectacle of brutal mass murder laid before us on those gentle Scottish hills. From before the Lockerbie trial, whilst still believing in Megrahi's guilt, I hoped even then that commercial links could be rebuilt between Libya and Britain for the benefit of both in the future. That was one of the reasons I went to talk to Gaddafi in 1991. It seemed that Libya's 5 million people with that country's immense oil wealth could mesh well with the many skilled people available among the 5 million population of Scotland.

What I heard at Zeist converted me to believing that the Libyan pair were in fact not involved in the atrocity after all. I remembered Nelson's comment at the time when a trial was agreed "No one country should be complainant, prosecutor and Judge". Yet under Clinton's presidency, the composition of the court had been altered so that Nelson's warning had been ignored. It was President Clinton too who told us all to realise 'its the economy, stupid.' But the UK, in the form of Scottish law, was now to exclude any international element, and the methods used to assemble the evidence revealed that the UK/US collusion was so close that it was safe to consider that alliance as Nelson's 'one country' also.

These matters are political and we have no expertise in that field, which appears distasteful to many. I do feel though that Lord Mandelson's disingenuous comments on the issue of the 'Prisoner Transfer Agreement' should lead him to resign (yet again).

More than 20 years later, we, the relatives, are still denied a full inquiry into the real issues for us - Who was behind the bombing? How was it carried out? Why did the Thatcher government of the day ignore all the warnings they got before Lockerbie? Why did they refuse even to meet us to discuss the setting up of this inquiry? Why was the information about the Heathrow break-in concealed for 12 years so that the trial court did not hear of it till after verdict? Why were we constantly subjected to the ignominy of being denied the truth as to why our families were not protected in what even our crippled FAI (crippled because it too was denied the information about Heathrow) found to have been a preventable disaster?

Let us stop mulling over the why and wherefore of Megrahi's release, I for one am delighted that a man I now consider innocent because of the evidence I was allowed to hear at Zeist is at home with his family at last. Let there be a responsible replacement immediately for the appeal a dying man understandably abandoned to ensure his release. Scotland should now take responsibility for reviewing a verdict which her own SCCRC already distrusts.The public's knowledge of the shifty dealings surrounding the 'Prisoner Transfer Agreement' should help to swell demand for objective assessment of the Megrahi case. Overturning the verdict would open the way for a proper international inquiry into why Lockerbie was allowed to happen, who was really behind it, as well as how the verdict came to be reached.

Let us turn our attention now, please, at last to the question of why we the relatives have been denied our rights to know who really murdered their families, and why those precious lives were not protected.

"In our thoughts and prayers continuously"

[Nelson Mandela's message to Megrahi is the heading over an item posted today on John Ashton’s website Megrahi: You are my Jury.  It reads as follows:]

Nelson Mandela visited Abdelbaset al-Megrahi in Barlinnie prison on 10 June 2002. Here is Abdelbaset’s account of the visit and below it a photo of the two men together and one of the inscriptions that Mr Mandela wrote in an Arabic version of his book Long Road to Freedom, which he gave to Abdelbaset:

Three months after my transfer to Barlinnie, Nelson Mandela kept his promise to visit me. That the world’s most respected statesman should again take the trouble to demonstrate his solidarity gave me a great lift. We chatted for sometime, mainly about the unjust guilty verdict. Having spent 27 years imprisoned on Robben Island, the agonies of prison life were etched into his soul. He asked me about my living conditions, the standard of my food and my bed, clearly aware of the huge importance of those things to a prisoner’s wellbeing. Before he left I introduced him again to my family, who thanked him and presented him with a bouquet of flowers. I was allowed to take photographs of him in the reception area and he signed my Arabic version of his book Long Walk to Freedom, which describes his prison years. In it he wrote: ‘To Comrade Megrahi, Best wishes to one who is in our thoughts and prayers continuously. Mandela.’

Following the meeting he held a press conference, in which he declared: ‘Megrahi is all alone. He has nobody he can talk to. It is a psychological persecution that a man must stay for the length of his long sentence all alone.’

Mandela calls for fresh Megrahi appeal

[What follows is the rext of a report published on the website of The Guardian on this date in 2002:]

Former South African president Nelson Mandela today called for a fresh appeal in the case of the Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi, and asked that the prisoner be transferred to serve out his sentence nearer his native Libya.

Mr Mandela met with al-Megrahi for more than an hour at Glasgow's Barlinnie prison, where he is serving a life sentence for murder. Megrahi was convicted last year of smuggling a bomb aboard Pan Am Flight 103, which exploded over Lockerbie on December 21 1988. The bombing killed 270 people.

Mr Mandela today called for Scottish authorities to consider Megrahi serving his term in a Muslim country closer to his family.

"Megrahi is all alone," Mr Mandela told a packed press conference in the prison's visitors' room. "He has nobody he can talk to. It is a psychological persecution that a man must stay for the length of his long sentence all alone."

Mr Mandela added: "It would be fair if he were transferred to a Muslim country - and there are Muslim countries which are trusted by the west. It will make it easier for his family to visit him if he is in a place like the kingdom of Morocco, Tunisia or Egypt."

Mr Mandela also hopes to meet the prime minister, Tony Blair, and the US president, George Bush, to discuss the case.

Mr Mandela, who spent more than 20 years as a prisoner of South Africa's apartheid regime, said Megrahi was being "harassed" by other inmates at Barlinnie.

"He says he is being treated well by the officials but when he takes exercise he has been harassed by a number of prisoners. He cannot identify them because they shout at him from their cells through the windows and sometimes it is difficult even for the officials to know from which quarter the shouting occurs," he said.

During the 30-minute press conference, Mr Mandela described in detail how a four-judge commission from the Organisation for African Unity had criticised the basis by which Megrahi came to be convicted.

"They have criticised it fiercely, and it will be a pity if no court reviews the case itself," said Mr Mandela. "From the point of view of fundamental principles of natural law, it would be fair if he is given a chance to appeal either to the privy council or the European court of human rights."

Mr Mandela played a crucial role in persuading Libya to hand over the two men suspected of the bombing to be tried in a Scottish court in the Netherlands. He has been in touch with the Libyan leader, Colonel Gaddafi, about Megrahi's case.

Today the Labour MP Tam Dalyell, the father of the House of Commons, welcomed confirmation of Mr Mandela's visit and reiterated his belief that Megrahi was a political prisoner who had been guilty only of sanctions busting.

He told BBC Radio Scotland: "I asked him [Megrahi] what he was doing in Malta. He told me in detail how he had been a sanctions buster - getting components for Libyan Arab Airlines because of the sanctions, going to Nigeria, Brazil, above all to Ethiopia, having contacts with Boeing, in order to get much needed parts for aircraft."

Mr Dalyell said he had evidence, never presented at the trial, that may prove Megrahi's innocence. He claimed Iran had made a payment of $11m (£7.5m) to a militant Palestinian group two days after the bombing. 

Mandela's visit to Megrahi

[What follows is the text of a report published in The Independent on this date in 2002:]

Nelson Mandela is expected to fly to Britain this week for a compassionate meeting with the Libyan agent serving a 20-year sentence in a Scottish prison for his part in the Lockerbie bombing.

The former South African President is known to have sympathy for Abdelbaset Ali Mohammed al-Megrahi, who was jailed for his part in the terrorist outrage which killed 270 people. Mr Mandela is keen to reciprocate the support he received from Libya during the 27 years he was a political prisoner of South Africa's apartheid regime.

Megrahi has always protested that he did not help to destroy Pan Am flight 103 in December 1988. Despite losing an appeal against his conviction in March this year, his lawyers are planning an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights on 15 September and hope a show of support from Mr Mandela will help their case that their client was tried unfairly. Mr Mandela played a pivotal role in helping to break the diplomatic deadlock between Libya, the US and Britain that allowed the trial of Megrahi in Holland under Scottish jurisdiction.

Yesterday a spokesman for the Scottish Prison Service said no formal application had been made for a visit from Mr Mandela. But a spokesman for Megrahi's legal team said they hoped the visit would be this week.

Mr Mandela is visiting the Netherlands and aides have said that if he is well enough to travel and his schedule allows it, then he would visit Megrahi. The visit is being supported by Tam Dalyell, the veteran Labour MP and Father of the House, who has voiced his own belief that Megrahi is innocent. "I hope Mr Mandela will visit and come to the same conclusion I did, which is that Mr Megrahi had nothing to do with the Lockerbie bomb."

Yesterday, a spokesman for Megrahi's legal team said no concrete plans had been made for a visit but confirmed that Mr Mandela was sympathetic to their case. He added: "I cannot say for certain whether he will be coming to Scotland but I do know that it is his desire to come to Scotland to visit my client and, perhaps not surprisingly, Mr Megrahi is keen that President Mandela finds the time to come to so see him.

"President Mandela, when in prison himself, received substantial support from Libya. President Mandela has a fondness for Libya and support for it."

[RB: The visit took place one week later on 10 June 2002.]

Nelson Mandela confirms surrender of Lockerbie suspects imminent

[The following items are from this date in 1999:]

1. The following statement was issued today by the spokesman for Secretary-General Kofi Annan:

This afternoon, the Permanent Representative of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Ambassador Abuzed Omar Dorda, hand delivered to the Secretary-General a letter from Omar Mustafa Muntasser, Secretary of the General People's Committee of the People's Bureau for Foreign Liaison and International Cooperation of the Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya.

As already announced by President Nelson Mandela in Tripoli this morning, the letter confirms the readiness of Libya to proceed with the transfer of the two accused to the Netherlands. The Secretary-General is greatly encouraged by this development and the necessary arrangements will now be initiated by the Secretariat.

The Secretary-General has shared the letter with the Security Council.

The Secretary-General would like to record his warm appreciation of the efforts made by President Mandela, as well as Crown Prince Abdullah and others in order to bring this matter to a satisfactory conclusion, in cooperation with the authorities of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya.

2. Following is the text of remarks made today to the press by the President of the Security Council, Qin Huasun (China), following Council consultations:

Security Council members welcomed the letter from the Foreign Minister of Libya to the Secretary-General of 19 March 1999, indicating that the two suspects would be available for the Secretary-General to take custody of them on or before 6 April;

Security Council members reaffirmed existing Security Council resolutions as the basis to bring about a full and final resolution of the situation;

Security Council members looked forward to the implementation of that handover in accordance with the agreed arrangements and, taking into account also the information provided by the French authorities regarding UTA 772, to the immediate suspension of sanctions with a view to lifting them as soon as circumstances permit, in accordance with relevant Security Council resolutions;

Security Council members thanked the Secretary-General for his tireless efforts in reaching an understanding with Libya on the implementation of Security Council resolution 1192 (1998), and expressed appreciation also for the positive actions taken by the Governments of South Africa, Saudi Arabia and other countries in support of these efforts.

3. Lockerbie trial: new developments

On 19 March 1999 President Nelson Mandela of South Africa announced in Tripoli that Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi, the leader of Libya, had written to Kofi Annan, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, agreeing to surrender to him for trial the two Libyans (Abdel Baset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah) accused of bombing the Pan-Am jet over Lockerbie on 21 December 1988. The handover is to occur on or before 6 April 1999. UN sanctions against Libya in respect of the country’s failure to hand over the suspects will be lifted within 90 days of compliance. The trial will take place in the Netherlands under Scots criminal law and before a panel of three Scottish judges from the High Court of Justiciary.

Mandela meets UK Lockerbie families

[What follows is excerpted from a report published on the website of The Independent on this date in 2002:]

Both Egypt and Tunisia have agreed to accept the Libyan convicted of the Lockerbie bombing to serve his sentence, if the Government is willing to transfer him from his Scottish prison, Nelson Mandela said yesterday.

The former South African president added that the bereaved families of Lockerbie victims he met yesterday did not oppose Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi being moved from Glasgow's Barlinnie prison. Mr Mandela has called for Megrahi to be allowed a fresh appeal and for him to be permitted to serve his jail term in a Muslim country in the meantime. Mr Mandela has discussed the matter with presidents Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Ben Ali of Tunisia.

"I told the relatives [of the Lockerbie victims] that he would go to a country trusted by Britain and the United States to serve his sentence, and the length of the sentence would be determined by the Scottish authorities," he said.

"Nobody opposed it, and I was very happy with their response. They appear to be open-minded, not withstanding the wounds and the scars they have suffered."

Tony Blair had dismissed the idea of Megrahi, a member of Colonel Gaddafi's secret service, being moved to another country. But Mr Mandela said he would try to change the Prime Minister's mind. Mr Mandela was speaking to journalists in London after he had met the Lockerbie families. (...)

Mr Mandela played a key role in persuading Colonel Gaddafi to hand over Megrahi and his co-defendant, Al-Amin Khalifah Fhimah, for trial at the specially constituted Scottish court at Zeist, in the Netherlands.

But he has expressed grave disquiet over the subsequent conviction of Megrahi for smuggling a bomb on board the Pan Am jet in 1988, killing 270 people. Megrahi, 49, is serving a life sentence after losing an appeal.

Mr Mandela said he had told the relatives how a UN representative and judges from the Organisation of African Unity had criticised the evidence against Megrahi.

[RB: A report on Mandela’s meeting with the UK Lockerbie relatives published on the BBC News website can be read here.]

Mandela visits Megrahi in Barlinnie

[What follows is excerpted from a report published on The Telegraph website on this date in 2002:]

Nelson Mandela today met the convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi at Barlinnie Jail in Glasgow and called for a fresh appeal in the case.

The former South African president visited Megrahi for more than an hour at the prison. (...)

Mr Mandela said he also hoped to meet Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George Bush to discuss the case. (...)

During the 30-minute press conference, Mr Mandela described in detail how a four-judge commission from the Organisation of African Unity had criticised the basis by which Megrahi came to be convicted at a special Scottish court, sitting in the Netherlands, in 2001.

Megrahi was convicted of murder for smuggling a bomb aboard Pan Am Flight 103 which exploded over Lockerbie on December 21, 1988 with the loss of 270 lives.

"They have criticised it fiercely, and it will be a pity if no court reviews the case itself," said Mr Mandela.

He said it had been suggested that the case could go either to the Privy Council or the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

"From the point of view of fundamental principles of natural law, it would be fair if he is given a chance to appeal either to the Privy Council or the European Court of Human Rights," said Mr Mandela.

Mr Mandela set out his views clearly in what must be the most extraordinary press conference ever held within the Victorian-built jail. He had arrived there earlier amid strict security for his meeting with Al Megrahi - and later in the day, with Al Megrahi's family, also inside the prison.

He travelled there in a people carrier with darkened windows, flanked by police cars and motorcycle outriders. He was taken to see Al Megrahi after meeting prison chiefs.

Mr Mandela, who did not have to undergo any security checks, was escorted to Al Megrahi's living room along with members of his entourage.

Al Megrahi is kept in a cell of his own within the prison, in a section nicknamed by other inmates as Gaddafi's Cafe.

Among those who met Mandela at the prison was Al Megrahi's lawyer, Eddie MacKechnie, who had earlier told reporters of what he claimed was new information which had not been made available to the trial at the time of Megrahi's conviction.

"An 11 million dollar payment was made by the government of Iran to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command two days after the atrocity," said Mr MacKechnie.

He said the information had come from a former CIA officer who had given details of times, dates and bank accounts, adding: "My concern is not simply that there is evidence of such payment, but whether that information was available to any British authorities."

Al Megrahi's case has also been taken up by Labour MP Tam Dalyell, who said today: "It is a thousand pities that Mr Megrahi's pleas to go into the witness box (at his trial) were not heeded."

Mr Dalyell, MP for Linlithgow, who visited Al Megrahi in jail three weeks ago said: "I asked him what he was doing in Malta and he told me in detail how he had been a sanctions buster - getting components for Libyan Arab Airlines because of the sanctions.

"He was going to Nigeria, Brazil and above all to Ethiopia, having contacts with Boeing, in getting much needed parts for aircraft of Libyan Arab Airlines."

Of Mandela, Shamuyarira and the Lockerbie affair

[This is the headline over a report published today on the website of the Zimbabwean newspaper The Herald.  It reads in part:]

Tributes to veteran nationalist, journalist and politician Nathan Shamuyarira who died on June 4 at the age of 85 underlined his diplomatic and political achievements at local, regional and international levels.

As tributes poured in, Shamuyarira was described as a remarkable and admirable politician who contributed immensely to the shaping and development of Zimbabwe’s media and foreign policy. (...)

In April, 1999, Nelson Mandela refused to take full credit for the Lockerbie breakthrough which resulted in Libya handing over two suspects of the PanAm bombing over Lockerbie in 1988 in which 270 people were killed.

Speaking to businessmen in Midrand, the anti-apartheid struggle leader said there were other people who played an important role in the negotiations, singling out former Zimbabwean Foreign Affairs Minister Nathan Shamuyarira.

“He is the person who came to me and said let’s talk and settle this issue,” Mandela was quoted as saying, adding that he then spoke to former American President George Bush and Saudi Arabia’s King Fahed.

“Without these two (Shamuyarira and King Fahed) I don’t think there would have been a breakthrough,” he said.

Mandela was not puffed up by the huge praise he got internationally for his role in the Lockerbie diplomatic effort.

He repeatedly shrugged off the praise.

Shamuyarira too, shrugged off the praise, only demonstrating his distinctive brilliance and unmatched determination to have the Libyan suspects in the Lockerbie bombing tried in a neutral country.

In an interview in April 1999, Shamuyarira said there were a number of inconsistencies in the case that pointed to a political victimisation of Libya and if brought to court, such evidence would exonerate Abdel Basset al-Megrahi and Al–Amin Khalifa Fahima.

“I have evidence that convinced me and Presidents Mugabe and Nelson Mandela and other world leaders that the Libyans were not involved.

“It was on the basis of these inconsistencies that I asked the two presidents to seek a fair trial for the two men,” Shamuyarira was quoted saying then.

According to a news agency report, one of the factors Shamuyarira felt would work for the Libyans when their trial starts in the Netherlands was that some people scheduled to fly on the Pan Am Flight 103 from Frankfurt to New York on December 20 1988 were apparently warned that the flight was doomed and should change.

The plane blew up over Lockerbie in Scotland and killed 259 passengers and crew and 11 people on the ground.

“One of these people is then South African foreign affairs minister Pik Botha who was scheduled to take that flight to New York. He and others were tipped off and changed flights.

“Whoever tipped them had prior knowledge of the bomb and if it were the Libyans, surely, the last person they would tip was Botha given the animosity between Libya and South Africa the,” said Shamuyarira who served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs between 1985 and 1995.

This earned Shamuyarira who initiated talks that the Libyan suspects be tried in a neutral country, wide acclaim and made him to become a true giant of Zimbabwean and African foreign policy. (...)

Late veteran politician Dr Stan Mudenge who was Foreign Affairs Minister in 1999 described the breakthough as an African Union triumph over western bullying.

“When you look back at the whole issue, one can rightly say Africa as a whole won a major battle over western bullying. Each one of us as Africans did their bit and we won,” Dr Mudenge said back then.

With the Lockerbie case, Shamuyarira showed that he was a formidable force of Pan African  diplomacy – an indefatigable champion in the cause of peace, who worked tirelessly for a better world through peaceful conflict resolution mechanism.

His energies devoted to finding a peaceful way forward for the Libyan case led to the suspension of the embargoes that had been put in place to force Tripoli to surrender the two men charged with blowing up Pan Am Flight 103.

Shamuyarira, who has been credited as the first person to initiate talks on the possibility of having the Libyans tried in a neutral country.

To some great measure, Shamuyarira’s pre-eminent role in the Lockerbie affair, forced Muammar Gaddafi, the deposed leader of Libya, who died on 20 October 2011, to ‘demote’ Pan Arabism as a plank of Libya’s foreign policy.

[I reproduce this because it pays tribute to an African politician who played a not insignificant part in resolving the Lockerbie impasse that existed in the late 1990s, not because it is in all respects accurate about the factual and political background, which it clearly is not. For example, the story about Pik Botha being warned off Pan Am 103 has been discredited. And the all-too common assumption that Gaddafi had the power to compel the two accused to surrender for trial whether they wanted to or not, is just simply false.  I was involved at the time in Lockerbie dealings with both the Libyan Government and the Libyan defence team headed by Dr Ibrahim Legwell. If the Libyan Government had had the power to deliver Megrahi and Fhimah to Zeist against their will, the pair would have been there long before April 1999. The Gaddafi regime had the power to prevent the suspects from voluntarily surrendering themselves for trial (eg by preventing them from leaving Libya). But that was as far as the regime’s power went. It had no power to compel them to stand trial at Zeist if they chose not to.  What impeded a resolution of the Lockerbie standoff for years was not the Libyan Government nor the Libyan defence team, but the governments of the United Kingdom and the United States. It was on these governments that Mandela, Shamuyarira and others had to exert diplomatic and moral pressure to accept the solution that had long before been accepted by the Libyan authorities and the Libyan defence team. All this is explained here, for those interested in the true position.]

Fundamental principles were ignored

[What follows is the text of a report published on the website of The Guardian on this date in 2002 (and in the print edition of the newspaper the following day):]

The prison visitor arrived at Barlinnie mid-morning in a flurry of cars and police outriders. He bypassed the bleak waiting room with its metal benches and chipped linoleum and was led, without being searched, straight to a suite of cells deep within the grim Victorian fortress on Glasgow's eastern edge.

The inmate he had come to see greeted him with a handshake. They sat and talked for more than an hour. The statesman and the convicted mass killer: Nelson Mandela and the Lockerbie bomber.

For Mr Mandela, it was a defining experience. Emerging to talk to the press, the former South African president called immediately for a fresh appeal and for Abdel Baset al-Megrahi to be transferred from Britain to a Muslim prison. The Libyan's solitary confinement in Scotland's toughest jail was nothing short of "psychological persecution", he said. And too many questions had been raised about his conviction to let the matter rest. An urgent meeting would be sought with both Tony Blair and the US president, George Bush, to plead Megrahi's case.

Mr Mandela, 83, has long been troubled by Lockerbie. He played a crucial role in persuading the Libyan leader, Colonel Muammar Gadafy, to hand over the two men suspected of involvement in the 1988 atrocity which left 270 people dead, and has followed events closely. Last week he announced he intended to travel to Glasgow to check on Megrahi's welfare.

Megrahi faces 20 years in isolation in Barlinnie after his conviction at the Scottish court in the Netherlands. His co-defendant, Al-Amin Khalifah Fhimah, was acquitted. The Libyan, who does not have to slop out like other prisoners and has access to kitchen facilities and an interpreter, told Mr Mandela that staff treated him well but he had been taunted by other inmates when he exercised.

"Megrahi is all alone," Mr Mandela said afterwards. "He has nobody he can talk to. It is a psychological persecution that a man must stay for the length of his long sentence all alone. It would be fair if he transferred to a Muslim country - and there are Muslim countries which are trusted by the west. It will make it easier for his family to visit him if he is in a place like the kingdom of Morocco, Tunisia or Egypt.

"He says he is being treated well by the officials but when he takes exercise he has been harassed by a number of prisoners. He cannot identify them because they shout at him from their cells through the windows."

Composed and often jovial, Mr Mandela refused to say whether he believed Megrahi to be innocent or to criticise the Scottish judicial system directly. "My belief is irrelevant," he said.

But he listed criticisms of the judgment which led to Megrahi's jailing, including the views of a four-judge commission from the Organisation of African Unity: "This is what other legal men, other judges are saying of this judgment. They have criticised it ferociously and it will be a pity if no court reviews the case itself. From the point of view of fundamental principles of natural law, it would be fair if he is given a chance to appeal either to the privy council or the European court of human rights."

Earlier, Megrahi's lawyer, Eddie MacKechnie, said new information had come to light about an alleged payment of $11m by the government of Iran to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command two days after the bombing. "We have interviewed twice a former CIA officer who has given us details of the payment; times, dates, and bank accounts," he said. "My concern is not simply that there is evidence of such payment, but whether that information was available to any British authorities."

Megrahi's defence team is pursuing a hearing at the European court of human rights which will be launched in Strasbourg in September.

Back inside Barlinnie, Mr Mandela said he did not regret his efforts to bring Megrahi to trial. "No. Why should I regret?" he said. "I got involved in the Lockerbie trial because there was a deadlock. And I intervened because I was thinking first of the relatives of the victims, that they must see justice done - but justice done according to the fundamental principles of law. It does appear from what the judges have said that these fundamental principles were ignored."

But his continued involvement in the case has upset some of the relatives. Susan Cohen of New Jersey, who lost her daughter Theodora, said Mr Mandela's visit to Barlinnie was "an attempt to make Megrahi appear to be the victim".

Mr Mandela said he had hoped to meet the relatives during his visit but time had been too short: "I am coming back here in July and it is my intention to visit Scotland and speak to all the victims of Lockerbie."

It was not strange for him to visit a prison, he said. His own 27 years of incarceration had been leavened by access to other inmates and a full library.

"Our minds were occupied every day with something positive, something productive," he said. "It is difficult for me to believe that I was in jail for 27 years because it seems to have gone very fast."