[This is the headline over a report published this evening on the STV News website. It reads in part:]
The former Labour MP told an audience in Edinburgh that the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing was innocent.
The man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing is not guilty, veteran politician Tam Dalyell has claimed.
Speaking three days before the second anniversary of Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill's decision to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds, Mr Dalyell also repeated his claim that former prime minister Margaret Thatcher personally dismissed calls for a public inquiry into the bombing.
The former MP told an audience at the Edinburgh International Book Festival that Megrahi "is not guilty as charged".
He said: "The people who did it were the gangs of [Ahmed] Jibril and Abu Nidal from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command (PFLP-GC).
"One of the reasons why the commission (The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission) said the verdict wasn't safe was the matter of the bill of £10m which was paid into the coffers of the PFLP-GC on December 23 1988, two days after Lockerbie."
The SCCRC referred Megrahi's conviction back to the High Court in 2007, but the appeal was subsequently dropped to clear the way for his compassionate release.
However, calls persist for a public inquiry, with Holyrood's Justice Committee preparing to consider a petition on the matter by the Justice For Megrahi group, led my Jim Swire whose daughter Flora died in the bombing.
However, Mr Dalyell claimed that Mrs Thatcher personally rejected earlier calls for an inquiry.
He said: "I asked her why, across 800 pages of her autobiography, that she didn't mention Lockerbie once.
"And she said: 'I didn't know about it...I don't know exactly what happened, and I don't write about things that I don't know about'."
He added: "It was clear by that time that she had been told by the Americans that they did not want a public inquiry.
"And you will remember that Jim Swire and John Mosey, the relatives, had gone to Cecil Parkinson, the Transport Secretary, who agreed that there should be a public inquiry.
"However, he came back rather sheepishly and said: 'I'm afraid my colleagues don't agree'.
"But there was only one colleague, and she didn't agree."
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Tam Dalyell. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query Tam Dalyell. Sort by date Show all posts
Wednesday 17 August 2011
Monday 8 April 2013
Margaret Thatcher and Lockerbie
[On the occasion of the death of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, here are excerpts from two posts from this blog’s archives:]
1. 23 March 2011
[A letter from Dr Jim Swire in yesterday's edition of The Herald reads as follows:]
In 1986, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher colluded with US President Ronald Reagan in facilitating the bombing of Tripoli and Benghazi – revenge for an alleged Libyan terrorist bomb in Germany.
Inspection of the Gaddafi family residence of the time, preserved as a ruin ever since, and seen on our screens again these days, makes it obvious that the US bomb which partially destroyed the residence had been intended to assassinate Muammar Gaddafi (“New Gaddafi blitz”, The Herald, March 21).
Instead the blast and shrapnel killed Gaddafi’s adopted daughter Hannah, aged 18 months, asleep in her bedroom. Some 30 Libyan civilians died too that night. Their relatives still grieve as we do.
In 1993, nearly two years after the publication of indictments of two Libyan citizens for their alleged part in causing the Lockerbie disaster, Lady Thatcher wrote, in praise of this action, in The Downing Street Years.
She wrote: “First it [the bombing raid] turned out to be a more decisive blow against Libyan-sponsored terrorism than I could ever have imagined … the much-vaunted Libyan counter attack did not and could not take place. Gaddafi had not been destroyed but he had been humbled. There was a marked decline in Libyan-sponsored terrorism in succeeding years.”
Two years later the Lockerbie tragedy occurred.
In 1991, when the indictments were issued, I first visited Gaddafi to beg him to allow his citizens to appear before a Scottish court. I also asked him to put up a picture of Flora on the wall of Hannah’s bedroom, beside one of Hannah. Beneath we put a message in Arabic and English. It was still there in 2010 when I was last in Tripoli.
It reads: “ The consequence of the use of violence is the death of innocent people.”
Even forbidden as we private citizens still are, to see the secret documents from those days, the sentiments of Flora’s message remain secure. I hope the plaque will not be destroyed in a second attempt at assassination. Libyans should decide their own future, as we ours.
2. 17 August 2011
The man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing is not guilty, veteran politician Tam Dalyell has claimed.
Speaking three days before the second anniversary of Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill's decision to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds, Mr Dalyell also repeated his claim that former prime minister Margaret Thatcher personally dismissed calls for a public inquiry into the bombing. (...)
However, calls persist for a public inquiry, with Holyrood's Justice Committee preparing to consider a petition on the matter by the Justice For Megrahi group, led my Jim Swire whose daughter Flora died in the bombing.
However, Mr Dalyell claimed that Mrs Thatcher personally rejected earlier calls for an inquiry.
He said: "I asked her why, across 800 pages of her autobiography, that she didn't mention Lockerbie once.
"And she said: 'I didn't know about it...I don't know exactly what happened, and I don't write about things that I don't know about'."
He added: "It was clear by that time that she had been told by the Americans that they did not want a public inquiry.
"And you will remember that Jim Swire and John Mosey, the relatives, had gone to Cecil Parkinson, the Transport Secretary, who agreed that there should be a public inquiry.
"However, he came back rather sheepishly and said: 'I'm afraid my colleagues don't agree'.
"But there was only one colleague, and she didn't agree."
[A further interesting insight about Margaret Thatcher and Lockerbie from Tam Dalyell can be read here.]
1. 23 March 2011
[A letter from Dr Jim Swire in yesterday's edition of The Herald reads as follows:]
In 1986, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher colluded with US President Ronald Reagan in facilitating the bombing of Tripoli and Benghazi – revenge for an alleged Libyan terrorist bomb in Germany.
Inspection of the Gaddafi family residence of the time, preserved as a ruin ever since, and seen on our screens again these days, makes it obvious that the US bomb which partially destroyed the residence had been intended to assassinate Muammar Gaddafi (“New Gaddafi blitz”, The Herald, March 21).
Instead the blast and shrapnel killed Gaddafi’s adopted daughter Hannah, aged 18 months, asleep in her bedroom. Some 30 Libyan civilians died too that night. Their relatives still grieve as we do.
In 1993, nearly two years after the publication of indictments of two Libyan citizens for their alleged part in causing the Lockerbie disaster, Lady Thatcher wrote, in praise of this action, in The Downing Street Years.
She wrote: “First it [the bombing raid] turned out to be a more decisive blow against Libyan-sponsored terrorism than I could ever have imagined … the much-vaunted Libyan counter attack did not and could not take place. Gaddafi had not been destroyed but he had been humbled. There was a marked decline in Libyan-sponsored terrorism in succeeding years.”
Two years later the Lockerbie tragedy occurred.
In 1991, when the indictments were issued, I first visited Gaddafi to beg him to allow his citizens to appear before a Scottish court. I also asked him to put up a picture of Flora on the wall of Hannah’s bedroom, beside one of Hannah. Beneath we put a message in Arabic and English. It was still there in 2010 when I was last in Tripoli.
It reads: “ The consequence of the use of violence is the death of innocent people.”
Even forbidden as we private citizens still are, to see the secret documents from those days, the sentiments of Flora’s message remain secure. I hope the plaque will not be destroyed in a second attempt at assassination. Libyans should decide their own future, as we ours.
2. 17 August 2011
The man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing is not guilty, veteran politician Tam Dalyell has claimed.
Speaking three days before the second anniversary of Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill's decision to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds, Mr Dalyell also repeated his claim that former prime minister Margaret Thatcher personally dismissed calls for a public inquiry into the bombing. (...)
However, calls persist for a public inquiry, with Holyrood's Justice Committee preparing to consider a petition on the matter by the Justice For Megrahi group, led my Jim Swire whose daughter Flora died in the bombing.
However, Mr Dalyell claimed that Mrs Thatcher personally rejected earlier calls for an inquiry.
He said: "I asked her why, across 800 pages of her autobiography, that she didn't mention Lockerbie once.
"And she said: 'I didn't know about it...I don't know exactly what happened, and I don't write about things that I don't know about'."
He added: "It was clear by that time that she had been told by the Americans that they did not want a public inquiry.
"And you will remember that Jim Swire and John Mosey, the relatives, had gone to Cecil Parkinson, the Transport Secretary, who agreed that there should be a public inquiry.
"However, he came back rather sheepishly and said: 'I'm afraid my colleagues don't agree'.
"But there was only one colleague, and she didn't agree."
[A further interesting insight about Margaret Thatcher and Lockerbie from Tam Dalyell can be read here.]
Saturday 2 April 2011
'Koussa told me Lockerbie wasn't Libya's fault' – Dalyell
[This is the headline over a report in today's edition of The Scotsman. It reads in part:]
Former MP and veteran campaigner Tam Dalyell says the high-level Libyan defector who arrived in the UK this week told him the Gaddafi regime had not been responsible for the Lockerbie bomb and pointed the finger at Palestinian terrorists.
Mr Dalyell also claimed that Scottish authorities could not be trusted to question former Libyan foreign minister Moussa Koussa, who has been a key figure in the Gaddafi regime for most of its 42 years. (...)
He is being kept in a safe house and has been questioned by MI6 officers and diplomats, but the Crown Office in Scotland is still pressing its claim to interview him about Lockerbie.
Mr Dalyell, who has long campaigned to find the truth behind the murder of 270 people when Pan Am Flight 103 was blown up over Lockerbie on 21 December, 1988, held a one-and-a-half-hour meeting Mr Koussa at an Inter Parliamentary Union conference in Syria in March 2001.
The former MP said: "He asked to see me and we met along with John Cummings, who was then the MP for Easington. He wanted to discuss how to bring Libya back into the international community.
Obviously, Lockerbie played a large part in our discussions, but when I asked him about it, he said ‘that was none of my doing'."
Mr Dalyell maintains the real perpetrator of the crime was the Iranian-funded Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, headed by Ahmed Jibril, although the main suspect, Abu Nidal, was probably tortured to death by Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq in 2002.
The organisation has been linked in a conspiracy theory involving a tacit agreement between the US authorities and the Iranian regime to allow a tit-for-tat revenge attack following the shooting down of an Iranian passenger plane in July 1988 by the USS Vincennes, with the loss of 290 lives .
Mr Dalyell told The Scotsman: "When I asked him [Koussa] about Nidal and Jabril, he said ‘you may not be wrong'.
"I do believe he knew a lot more about what happened than he was willing to tell me."
Despite the former spymaster's formidable reputation, Mr Dalyell said he found him "extremely friendly and frank".
"Other people have described him as scary, but I saw none of that," he said. (...)
But Mr Dalyell did not believe the Scottish authorities should be allowed to speak to Koussa. He said: "I think that two generations on, the officers at Dumfries and Galloway police force will be under terrible pressure to justify the investigation carried out by their predecessors."
He was more scathing about the Crown Office, which he has criticised for its handling of the case of Abdelbaset Mohmed Ali al-Megrahi, the only man found guilty of the attack, a conviction Mr Dalyell has claimed was wrong. "As I have said before, I believe that at times the Crown Office has been duplicitous about this," he said. "So they would be the wrong people to question him."
He said British diplomat Sir Richard Dalton was best-qualified to lead the questioning of Gaddafi's former close aide.
The Crown Office said it did not wish to comment on an "individual's comments" but that it was still in discussions with the Foreign Office regarding interviewing Mr Koussa over the Lockerbie bombing.
A spokesman said: "We are liaising with the Foreign Office regarding an interview with Mr Koussa. As with any ongoing investigation, we will not go into the details of our inquiries which includes the dates of interviews with any individuals."
[This story has now been picked up by the Libyan Enlish-language newspaper The Tripoli Post.
Moussa Koussa has also in conversation with me denied that Libya was responsible for Lockerbie. The response to this from those still blindly convinced of the truth of the official version of events will, of course, be "He would say that, wouldn't he?"
The following are excerpts from a report in today's edition of The Herald:]
A friend of Moussa Koussa, who claims he helped to co-ordinate his defection to the UK, has said the former Libyan foreign minister will be very co-operative in giving key evidence about the Lockerbie bombing.
Noman Benotman, who now works as an analyst with the Quilliam Foundation, a counter-terrorism think-tank, made it clear that Koussa would be willing to open up to the British authorities about Libya’s past involvement in international terrorism, including the 1988 Lockerbie bombing which claimed 270 lives. (...)
Mr Benotman, who said he helped Koussa escape from Tripoli, said it would “not be an issue” for the UK Government to get information about Libyan-sponsored terrorism, including the bombing of a UTA flight in Niger in 1989.
He said: “It’s going to be very easy to handle all these issues regarding Lockerbie, UTA and the IRA as well. It’s not a problem, I’m sure about this.”
He said Koussa “is the regime – everybody knows that” and that he was one of only five people during the last 30 years who was close to Gaddafi.
“I want to emphasise ... why he chose London. It’s very important. He believes in the system of justice regardless of the outcomes. He is very co-operative regarding crucial intelligence,” added Mr Benotman, who was the leader of the jihadist and anti-Gaddafi Libyan Islamic Fighting Group before he worked for the Quilliam Foundation.
First Minister Alex Salmond said police want to talk to Koussa “on the basis of information that might be provided” and that there was no suggestion at this stage that he was being treated as a suspect.
“Nonetheless, there is every reason to believe that this individual can shed light on the Lockerbie atrocity and the circumstances that led up to it,” Mr Salmond said.
[The Herald has an editorial on the Moussa Koussa "defection" issue which can be read here.
I find it more than a little surprising that a person who was "the leader of the jihadist and anti-Gaddafi Islamic Fighting Group" should be a friend of decades-long Gaddafi loyalist and henchman Moussa Koussa. As for helping him "to escape from Tripoli", Moussa travelled to Djerba in Tunisia in an official Libyan Government car, accompanied by Abdel Ati al-Obeidi, one of Gaddafi's most trusted counsellors.]
Former MP and veteran campaigner Tam Dalyell says the high-level Libyan defector who arrived in the UK this week told him the Gaddafi regime had not been responsible for the Lockerbie bomb and pointed the finger at Palestinian terrorists.
Mr Dalyell also claimed that Scottish authorities could not be trusted to question former Libyan foreign minister Moussa Koussa, who has been a key figure in the Gaddafi regime for most of its 42 years. (...)
He is being kept in a safe house and has been questioned by MI6 officers and diplomats, but the Crown Office in Scotland is still pressing its claim to interview him about Lockerbie.
Mr Dalyell, who has long campaigned to find the truth behind the murder of 270 people when Pan Am Flight 103 was blown up over Lockerbie on 21 December, 1988, held a one-and-a-half-hour meeting Mr Koussa at an Inter Parliamentary Union conference in Syria in March 2001.
The former MP said: "He asked to see me and we met along with John Cummings, who was then the MP for Easington. He wanted to discuss how to bring Libya back into the international community.
Obviously, Lockerbie played a large part in our discussions, but when I asked him about it, he said ‘that was none of my doing'."
Mr Dalyell maintains the real perpetrator of the crime was the Iranian-funded Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, headed by Ahmed Jibril, although the main suspect, Abu Nidal, was probably tortured to death by Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq in 2002.
The organisation has been linked in a conspiracy theory involving a tacit agreement between the US authorities and the Iranian regime to allow a tit-for-tat revenge attack following the shooting down of an Iranian passenger plane in July 1988 by the USS Vincennes, with the loss of 290 lives .
Mr Dalyell told The Scotsman: "When I asked him [Koussa] about Nidal and Jabril, he said ‘you may not be wrong'.
"I do believe he knew a lot more about what happened than he was willing to tell me."
Despite the former spymaster's formidable reputation, Mr Dalyell said he found him "extremely friendly and frank".
"Other people have described him as scary, but I saw none of that," he said. (...)
But Mr Dalyell did not believe the Scottish authorities should be allowed to speak to Koussa. He said: "I think that two generations on, the officers at Dumfries and Galloway police force will be under terrible pressure to justify the investigation carried out by their predecessors."
He was more scathing about the Crown Office, which he has criticised for its handling of the case of Abdelbaset Mohmed Ali al-Megrahi, the only man found guilty of the attack, a conviction Mr Dalyell has claimed was wrong. "As I have said before, I believe that at times the Crown Office has been duplicitous about this," he said. "So they would be the wrong people to question him."
He said British diplomat Sir Richard Dalton was best-qualified to lead the questioning of Gaddafi's former close aide.
The Crown Office said it did not wish to comment on an "individual's comments" but that it was still in discussions with the Foreign Office regarding interviewing Mr Koussa over the Lockerbie bombing.
A spokesman said: "We are liaising with the Foreign Office regarding an interview with Mr Koussa. As with any ongoing investigation, we will not go into the details of our inquiries which includes the dates of interviews with any individuals."
[This story has now been picked up by the Libyan Enlish-language newspaper The Tripoli Post.
Moussa Koussa has also in conversation with me denied that Libya was responsible for Lockerbie. The response to this from those still blindly convinced of the truth of the official version of events will, of course, be "He would say that, wouldn't he?"
The following are excerpts from a report in today's edition of The Herald:]
A friend of Moussa Koussa, who claims he helped to co-ordinate his defection to the UK, has said the former Libyan foreign minister will be very co-operative in giving key evidence about the Lockerbie bombing.
Noman Benotman, who now works as an analyst with the Quilliam Foundation, a counter-terrorism think-tank, made it clear that Koussa would be willing to open up to the British authorities about Libya’s past involvement in international terrorism, including the 1988 Lockerbie bombing which claimed 270 lives. (...)
Mr Benotman, who said he helped Koussa escape from Tripoli, said it would “not be an issue” for the UK Government to get information about Libyan-sponsored terrorism, including the bombing of a UTA flight in Niger in 1989.
He said: “It’s going to be very easy to handle all these issues regarding Lockerbie, UTA and the IRA as well. It’s not a problem, I’m sure about this.”
He said Koussa “is the regime – everybody knows that” and that he was one of only five people during the last 30 years who was close to Gaddafi.
“I want to emphasise ... why he chose London. It’s very important. He believes in the system of justice regardless of the outcomes. He is very co-operative regarding crucial intelligence,” added Mr Benotman, who was the leader of the jihadist and anti-Gaddafi Libyan Islamic Fighting Group before he worked for the Quilliam Foundation.
First Minister Alex Salmond said police want to talk to Koussa “on the basis of information that might be provided” and that there was no suggestion at this stage that he was being treated as a suspect.
“Nonetheless, there is every reason to believe that this individual can shed light on the Lockerbie atrocity and the circumstances that led up to it,” Mr Salmond said.
[The Herald has an editorial on the Moussa Koussa "defection" issue which can be read here.
I find it more than a little surprising that a person who was "the leader of the jihadist and anti-Gaddafi Islamic Fighting Group" should be a friend of decades-long Gaddafi loyalist and henchman Moussa Koussa. As for helping him "to escape from Tripoli", Moussa travelled to Djerba in Tunisia in an official Libyan Government car, accompanied by Abdel Ati al-Obeidi, one of Gaddafi's most trusted counsellors.]
Friday 24 April 2015
Death of Allan Francovich in 1997
US film-maker Allan Francovich, whose controversial documentary challenged the official British and American view that the Lockerbie bombing was solely the work of two Libyan agents, has died. A friend said Mr Francovich collapsed on April 17 at Houston airport, Texas.
He was pronounced dead at hospital where the cause was given as a heart attack. Mr David Ben-Aryeah, a friend, said Mr Francovich would be cremated in San Antonio, and that his ashes would later be brought to Skye for a ''service of celebration''.
Mr Francovich, who was in his early 50s [RB: He was 56], had written a script while on Skye and had also visited the island with bereaved Lockerbie parent, Dr Jim Swire, while making the Lockerbie documentary The Maltese Double Cross. Mr Ben-Aryeah said: ''While he was there he came to love the island, its tranquillity, its scenery and its people.''
The American made several other controversial documentaries, mostly concerning the work of the Central Intelligence Agency.
The Maltese Double Cross, which was shown to MPs in the Commons before being screened publicly in 1995, challenged the official US and British version of how a bomb brought down the New York-bound Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie on December 21, 1988.
Last night Linlithgow Labour MP Tam Dalyell, who collaborated with Mr Francovich in making the documentary, said he was ''very upset'' by news of his death. The MP described him as ''one of the most persistent seekers-of-truth'' he had ever met, ''an exceedingly brave man''.
Dr Swire, whose daughter died in the disaster, said he would be ''very much missed'' by those who considered that the truth on the Lockerbie disaster had yet to be told.
The 90-minute documentary, directed by Mr Francovich, claimed a huge cover-up had taken place. The film maintained that Iran and Syria plotted to bring down the aircraft as revenge for the US shooting down an Iranian Airbus months before the Lockerbie tragedy. It argued that the authorities knew the plane was going to be bombed, but did nothing to prevent it for fear of exposing a US-sponsored drug-smuggling operation.
Scotland's top law officer at the time, the Lord Advocate, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, criticised the screening by Channel 4. He said he deprecated all attempts to give a version of the atrocity ''from whatever angle'' while criminal proceedings were pending.
However, relatives of the 270 people who died welcomed the showing of the documentary saying people should be allowed ''to make up their own minds''.
Mr Dalyell said: ''It was my privilege to be Allan Francovich's collaborator in making the film, The Maltese Double Cross, which I believe exposed the truth that the Libyans were not responsible for the Lockerbie crime. ''I could not criticise the American and British governments more strongly for their refusal to address properly the explanations of Lockerbie.''
Dr Swire said: ''Speaking personally we view the loss of Allan as the loss of a close friend whose humour and determination was much appreciated and will be greatly missed.
Tuesday 26 May 2015
UK Government rejects neutral venue Lockerbie trial scheme
Scottish Secretary Ian Lang yesterday rejected a plea by Tory MP Sir Teddy Taylor for the law to be changed to enable two Libyans suspected of carrying out the 1988 Lockerbie bombing to be tried abroad.
Sir Teddy (Southend East) said leading and respected Scottish advocates had stated clearly and publicly that a fair trial before a Scottish jury was simply not possible because of recent press coverage.
He added that the Libyan Government had said it willingly would send the two accused to any other country.
Sir Teddy urged: ''In fairness to the relatives of the victims of this appalling disaster, it would be better for the Government to consider legislation, for example for a trial in The Hague, so the truth on this dreadful issue could at last come forward, rather than the present situation where nothing is happening for years.''
Mr Lang replied: ''But the investigation took place under Scots law and the charges are being brought on that basis.''
He insisted there was no evidence to support the contention the Libyan Government would be any more amenable to holding a trial in any other country, even if that were possible, ''which would be extremely difficult in the circumstances''.
Mr Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow -- Lab) claimed the Lord Advocate had not taken account of all the evidence in the case, and accused the Crown Office of being ''a bit lazy''.
Mr Lang retorted: ''You persist in setting yourself up as some kind of amateur sleuth in this matter.''
He pressed Mr Dalyell to support the Lord Advocate and the Government ''in seeking to enable this trial to take place''.
[In January 1994, I had secured the agreement of the suspects’ Libyan lawyer and the Libyan Government to a neutral venue trial. This had not been made public, but was known to Teddy Taylor MP, Tam Dalyell MP, the United Kingdom Government and the Scottish Crown Office. It took more than four more years (and a change of government) before the UK eventually saw the light.]
Wednesday 15 August 2012
Libyans were not the perpetrators, says Dalyell
[What follows is an excerpt from a long interview with Tam Dalyell published in today’s edition of The Scotsman:]
On the question of Lockerbie, he remains convinced of Libya’s innocence and states, in his book [The Importance of Being Awkward: The Autobiography of Tam Dalyell], that the United States was aware of the plot to bomb the Pan Am flight by Iran as retaliation for the downing by America of an Iranian passenger jet in the summer of 1988. As he writes: “I came to conclude that a Faustian agreement had been reached, whereby the Americans would connive at one airliner being destroyed.” As he corrals two volumes of research into seven pages in his memoir, it is best to conclude that nothing will change his mind: “What I think is that the Libyans might have known about it. Were they the perpetrators? No, they were not.”
On the question of Lockerbie, he remains convinced of Libya’s innocence and states, in his book [The Importance of Being Awkward: The Autobiography of Tam Dalyell], that the United States was aware of the plot to bomb the Pan Am flight by Iran as retaliation for the downing by America of an Iranian passenger jet in the summer of 1988. As he writes: “I came to conclude that a Faustian agreement had been reached, whereby the Americans would connive at one airliner being destroyed.” As he corrals two volumes of research into seven pages in his memoir, it is best to conclude that nothing will change his mind: “What I think is that the Libyans might have known about it. Were they the perpetrators? No, they were not.”
Friday 4 August 2017
Immunity ruled out in Lockerbie row
[This is the headline over a report published in The Herald on this date in 1995. It reads as follows:]
The Lord Advocate yesterday effectively rejected the possibility of a disgraced former American intelligence agent being granted diplomatic immunity to allow him to give evidence on the Lockerbie bombing.
The Lord Advocate yesterday effectively rejected the possibility of a disgraced former American intelligence agent being granted diplomatic immunity to allow him to give evidence on the Lockerbie bombing.
Mr Lester Coleman, a former US intelligence agent, has said he is willing to come to Scotland to give evidence on the outrage provided he was offered immunity from extradition to the United States.
However, Scotland's senior law officer said yesterday that neither the Crown Office nor the Scottish Office had any role or authority in relation to the extradition of Mr Coleman to the US, where warrants have been issued for his arrest. That was a matter for the Home Office and the English courts.
The comments by the Lord Advocate, Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, made in a reply to Mr Tam Dalyell, Labour MP for Linlithgow, came on the same day that former Scottish Office Minister Allan Stewart called for the former American intelligence agent to be granted immunity from extradition to allow him to give evidence on the PanAm bombing to a Scottish court.
Mr Stewart, Conservative MP for Eastwood, speaking on Radio Scotland's Newsdrive programme yesterday, said: ''I think unquestionably he (Lester Coleman) should be granted immunity from extradition.
''There are very many questions about the Lockerbie tragedy. He says he has got very substantial evidence to offer. I cannot see why we in Britain have anything at all to lose by giving Lester Coleman the opportunity to put forward that evidence.''
He added: ''The Crown Prosecution Service appears to have decided who is guilty. I cannot understand why they seem to have this single-track approach and to be ruling out any other.''
Asked if he believed that the Lockerbie investigation was being hampered by a cover-up, Mr Stewart said: ''I think it is extremely odd ... that other possible avenues of exploration to get at the truth about Lockerbie simply appear not to be being explored. That cannot be right.''
Mr Stewart's plea came just a few days after Mr Dalyell urged the Lord Advocate to give diplomatic immunity to Mr Coleman to uncover the part he claimed the US played in the Lockerbie tragedy.
Mr Dalyell said Mr Coleman was willing to speak to Scottish police about an alleged security loophole set up by the US which resulted in a bomb being placed on PanAm flight 103 at Frankfurt airport.
Mr Coleman's theory of a link with a drugs run from Lebanon through Cyprus and Germany was the conclusion of a book about him by Mr Donald Goddard, called The Trail of the Octopus. The book is now the subject of a libel action by another US agent.
Mr Coleman believes the bomb got on to the jet because US intelligence agents in Beirut in 1988 agreed with Lebanese terrorists to facilitate a route for drugs from Lebanon to the US in exchange for information about Western hostages.
Luggage containing drugs was protected by US intelligence, with normal security restrictions on baggage at airports removed. However, he alleges, the terrorists exploited the loophole by exchanging a bag of drugs with a bag containing a bomb at Frankfurt airport.
Mr Coleman was based in Beirut at the time and often travelled to Cyprus, where he had dealings with the American Drug Enforcement Agency.
Shortly after the book was published in 1993, Mr Coleman was indicted on charges of perjury and travelling on a false passport. He fled the US and is now in hiding.
The Lord Advocate, in his written reply to Mr Dalyell, the contents of which were published yesterday, explained that the Crown's position was based on evidence, and that careful consideration was given to any information received and appropriate investigations carried out.
In reply to Mr Dalyell's request that Mr Coleman be allowed to enter the UK with the promise of immunity from extradition to talk with the police, the Lord Advocate, says: ''Neither the Crown Office nor Scottish Office has any role or authority in relation to extradition to the United States.
''The procedures for extradition as between the United Kingdom and the United States are the responsibility of the Home Office and the English Courts.''
Mr Dalyell said he found it ''extraordinarily odd'' that responsibility for extradition in Scotland was a matter for the Home Office and the English courts.
The MP said: ''Two Scottish lawyers have told me that they thought extradition and immunity from extradition north of the Border would be the responsibility of the Crown Office or the Scottish Office.
''The Lord Advocate's statement has certainly raised eyebrows in Scottish legal circles.''
Thursday 25 June 2015
Let foreign judges sort out mess on Lockerbie
[This is part of the headline over a report published in The Herald on this date in 2007. It reads as follows:]
Judges from outside Scotland could be required to clear up the potential damage to the reputation of Scottish justice if the Lockerbie trial verdict is declared to be a potential miscarriage of justice this week.
That was proposed yesterday by Tam Dalyell, the former Labour MP for Linlithgow and a long-time campaigner for the verdict on Britain's worst case of mass murder to be reconsidered.
Yesterday he joined fellow campaigner Jim Swire, father of a victim of the bombing of PanAm flight 103, in calling on the SNP-led administration at Holyrood to call an independent public inquiry into the handling of the Lockerbie inquiry.
A spokeswoman for the administration said yesterday that it awaits Thursday's finding by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC), adding: "It is the strong view of the Scottish government that due process of law will be followed and be seen to be followed in all matters pertaining to this case."
Mr Dalyell protests the innocence of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, the man found guilty of planting a bomb on the flight that blew up over Lockerbie in December 1988, killing 270 people. There is a growing expectation the SCCRC will conclude that there may have been a miscarriage of justice and refer the case to the Court of Appeal.
Mr Dalyell recently met the former Libyan intelligence officer at Greenock Prison, where he is serving 27 years. The former MP quoted him as admitting he had been breaking United Nations sanctions against Libya at the time of the bombing: "He said he was getting spare parts for Libya's oil industry and Libyan Arab Airlines, and that is why he travelled so much," said Mr Dalyell.
He argues that revelations about the weakness of the prosecution case will raise questions about the quality of the defence, and why there was so little challenge to the reliability of key witness Tony Gauci, who claimed to have seen Megrahi in Malta, but is alleged to have changed his version of events in crucial ways.
If the SCCRC comes out against the conviction, Mr Dalyell claimed: "It will be shattering for the whole system of Scottish justice."
It was claimed that too many senior judges have been involved in past proceedings on the Lockerbie bombing. "They should call in a couple of judges from another jurisdiction, and not necessarily England," said the former MP. "But of course, they have got to do it quickly."
Several newspapers yesterday published details of the appeal lawyers' case, much of it focusing on the pivotal evidence from the Maltese shopkeeper.
There were accusations that other vital evidence was lost, destroyed or tampered with, and that there was interference with the police inquiry and prosecution case on both sides of the Atlantic. There was also a claim that the SCCRC's finding, after three-and-a-half years, was reached 18 months ago but has been delayed.
The case carries a risk that an acquittal could lead the Libyan government to claim back the $2.7bn it paid to families of the Lockerbie victims, a bill that could come to the Scottish Executive.
Megrahi was the subject of the first spat between the SNP administration and Downing Street after Tony Blair last month signed a memorandum of understanding on prisoner transfer with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi but neglected to consult Scottish authorities in advance.
Monday 19 September 2016
Lockerbie inquiry commitment dishonoured
[What follows is excerpted from an article by Tam Dalyell MP entitled The Lockerbie scapegoat that was published in The Spectator in August 2002:]
At no point did Megrahi get the chance to tell his story. When I went to see him with his solicitor, Mr Eddie McKechnie, in Barlinnie, he expressed his dismay that his previous defence team had prevailed upon him, against his every instinct, not to go into the witness box. Had he done so, he would have made the convincing case that he was not a member of the Libyan intelligence services, but a sanctions-buster, scouring Africa and South America and the Boeing Company for spare parts to allow Libyan Arab Airlines to continue operating in the face of sanctions. (...)
There should have been an inquiry. For an adversarial system of justice to arrive at the truth requires both of the adversaries to place before the court all information that was available to them. In the Lockerbie trial, the defence team of Abdelbaset al Megrahi chose not to do so. In such circumstances, the adversarial system simply does not work, and the objective becomes not to uncover the truth, but to find someone to shoulder the blame.
The British relatives of the Lockerbie victims were, as far back as 19 September 1989, offered an inquiry by the then secretary of state for transport, Cecil Parkinson — subject, he said, as they filed out of his room, to the agreement of colleagues. Somewhat sheepishly on 5 December 1989 Parkinson told the relatives that it had been decided at the highest level that there would be no inquiry.
[RB: In January 1995 Mr Dalyell had asked the Prime Minister, John Major, about the Parkinson meetings. Here is the Hansard report:]
Mr Dalyell To ask the Prime Minister if he will place in the Library his correspondence with Mr Martin Cadman, of the Lockerbie victims' relatives association, and in particular his response to Mr Cadman's letter of 18 December 1994, concerning Lord Parkinson's meetings on 19 September 1989 and 5 December 1989 with the relatives, and his answer of 15 December [1994], Official Report, column 1068.
The Prime Minister No, it is not my normal practice to do so.
Mr Dalyell To ask the Prime Minister if he will place in the Library a copy of his response to Lockerbie victim relative Rev John Mosey's letter to him of 28 December 1994.
The Prime Minister No, it is not my normal practice to do so.
Mr Dalyell To ask the Prime Minister if, following communications from Mr Martin Cadman, Pamela Dix, Rev John Mosey and Dr Jim Swire, relatives of Lockerbie victims, he has anything to add to his oral answer to the hon Member for Linlithgow of 15 December [1994], Official Report, column 1068.
The Prime Minister I understand that the meeting between Lord Parkinson and a group of British relatives of the Lockerbie victims to which I referred in my reply to the hon Gentleman on 15 December took place in December 1989, not in 1990. At that meeting, Lord Parkinson explained the Government's decision not to hold a confidential inquiry into the disaster, but said that the Lord Advocate was likely to hold a public fatal accident inquiry. I have received representations from several relatives of Lockerbie victims calling for a further inquiry. However, in view of all the investigations that have already been carried out, and the need to avoid the danger of prejudicing a criminal trial of the two accused, I do not believe such an inquiry is warranted.
Friday 19 December 2014
Lockerbie evidence planted or "improved"? "I don't know" said Lord Advocate Fraser.
Peter Fraser pins colours to the mast
In an article in The Times, the Lord Advocate at the time that charges were brought against Abdelbaset Megrahi and Lamin Fhimah for the destruction of Pan Am 103, Lord Fraser of Carmyllie QC, expresses his confidence in the evidence that led to the conviction of Megrahi. Here are excerpts:
'Lord Fraser does not discount the involvement of other states, but he points out that no definitive evidence has been produced to link them to the attack. The Libyans, on the other hand, were traced through the diligence of Scottish detectives, who managed to identify the manufacturers of clothing found in the suspect suitcase that had held the bomb. By proving that the clothing had been bought in Malta, and then establishing that the purchaser was al-Megrahi, they laid the foundations of the Crown case. “For me that was the most significant breakthrough,” Lord Fraser says now.'
'Tam Dalyell, the former MP, has argued that the CIA may have known about the attack beforehand. Lord Fraser rejects that. “I told Tam Dalyell: if there was a conspiracy, then I am in it up to the neck. I have to be involved. The only other possibility is that I have been so naive that bits of evidence have been planted, and I have swallowed it hook, line and sinker. But four other Lord Advocates have also examined the evidence and they have all concurred with it.”'
On the issue of the provenance of the MST-13 circuit board fragment which was crucial to the establishment of a link between Libya and the destruction of the aircraft, Lord Fraser hedges his bets somewhat:
'The discovery of a fragment of circuit board from a timer made by a Swiss company with links to Libya was critical to the prosecution. But accounts of how, where and by whom it was found varied. The original fragment was found several miles from the wreckage, and some weeks after the disaster.
'It was not until very much later that the CIA claimed to have identified it and matched it with a circuit board manufactured by Mebo of Zurich, a company run by Edwin Bollier, who had supplied timers to the Libyan Government. Some experts have argued that the find was just a bit too convenient to the US investigators, since, by targeting the Libyans, they could avoid falling out with Iran and Syria, important allies at the time of the Gulf War. So could the CIA have planted the evidence? “I don’t know,” says Lord Fraser. “No one ever came to me and said, ‘Now we can go for the Libyans’, it was never as straightforward as that. The CIA was extremely subtle. For me the significant evidence came when the Scottish police made the connection with Malta.” Pressed for his own view, he cites a Scottish murder case, that of Patrick Meehan, in which, it was alleged, the prosecution case had been “improved” by the planting of evidence. Was there a similarity? “I don’t know,” he said again, “but if there was one witness I was not happy about, it was Mr Bollier, who was deeply unreliable.”'
Friday 19 December 2008
Peter Fraser pins colours to the mast
In an article in The Times, the Lord Advocate at the time that charges were brought against Abdelbaset Megrahi and Lamin Fhimah for the destruction of Pan Am 103, Lord Fraser of Carmyllie QC, expresses his confidence in the evidence that led to the conviction of Megrahi. Here are excerpts:
'Lord Fraser does not discount the involvement of other states, but he points out that no definitive evidence has been produced to link them to the attack. The Libyans, on the other hand, were traced through the diligence of Scottish detectives, who managed to identify the manufacturers of clothing found in the suspect suitcase that had held the bomb. By proving that the clothing had been bought in Malta, and then establishing that the purchaser was al-Megrahi, they laid the foundations of the Crown case. “For me that was the most significant breakthrough,” Lord Fraser says now.'
'Tam Dalyell, the former MP, has argued that the CIA may have known about the attack beforehand. Lord Fraser rejects that. “I told Tam Dalyell: if there was a conspiracy, then I am in it up to the neck. I have to be involved. The only other possibility is that I have been so naive that bits of evidence have been planted, and I have swallowed it hook, line and sinker. But four other Lord Advocates have also examined the evidence and they have all concurred with it.”'
On the issue of the provenance of the MST-13 circuit board fragment which was crucial to the establishment of a link between Libya and the destruction of the aircraft, Lord Fraser hedges his bets somewhat:
'The discovery of a fragment of circuit board from a timer made by a Swiss company with links to Libya was critical to the prosecution. But accounts of how, where and by whom it was found varied. The original fragment was found several miles from the wreckage, and some weeks after the disaster.
'It was not until very much later that the CIA claimed to have identified it and matched it with a circuit board manufactured by Mebo of Zurich, a company run by Edwin Bollier, who had supplied timers to the Libyan Government. Some experts have argued that the find was just a bit too convenient to the US investigators, since, by targeting the Libyans, they could avoid falling out with Iran and Syria, important allies at the time of the Gulf War. So could the CIA have planted the evidence? “I don’t know,” says Lord Fraser. “No one ever came to me and said, ‘Now we can go for the Libyans’, it was never as straightforward as that. The CIA was extremely subtle. For me the significant evidence came when the Scottish police made the connection with Malta.” Pressed for his own view, he cites a Scottish murder case, that of Patrick Meehan, in which, it was alleged, the prosecution case had been “improved” by the planting of evidence. Was there a similarity? “I don’t know,” he said again, “but if there was one witness I was not happy about, it was Mr Bollier, who was deeply unreliable.”'
'Lord Fraser does not discount the involvement of other states, but he points out that no definitive evidence has been produced to link them to the attack. The Libyans, on the other hand, were traced through the diligence of Scottish detectives, who managed to identify the manufacturers of clothing found in the suspect suitcase that had held the bomb. By proving that the clothing had been bought in Malta, and then establishing that the purchaser was al-Megrahi, they laid the foundations of the Crown case. “For me that was the most significant breakthrough,” Lord Fraser says now.'
'Tam Dalyell, the former MP, has argued that the CIA may have known about the attack beforehand. Lord Fraser rejects that. “I told Tam Dalyell: if there was a conspiracy, then I am in it up to the neck. I have to be involved. The only other possibility is that I have been so naive that bits of evidence have been planted, and I have swallowed it hook, line and sinker. But four other Lord Advocates have also examined the evidence and they have all concurred with it.”'
On the issue of the provenance of the MST-13 circuit board fragment which was crucial to the establishment of a link between Libya and the destruction of the aircraft, Lord Fraser hedges his bets somewhat:
'The discovery of a fragment of circuit board from a timer made by a Swiss company with links to Libya was critical to the prosecution. But accounts of how, where and by whom it was found varied. The original fragment was found several miles from the wreckage, and some weeks after the disaster.
'It was not until very much later that the CIA claimed to have identified it and matched it with a circuit board manufactured by Mebo of Zurich, a company run by Edwin Bollier, who had supplied timers to the Libyan Government. Some experts have argued that the find was just a bit too convenient to the US investigators, since, by targeting the Libyans, they could avoid falling out with Iran and Syria, important allies at the time of the Gulf War. So could the CIA have planted the evidence? “I don’t know,” says Lord Fraser. “No one ever came to me and said, ‘Now we can go for the Libyans’, it was never as straightforward as that. The CIA was extremely subtle. For me the significant evidence came when the Scottish police made the connection with Malta.” Pressed for his own view, he cites a Scottish murder case, that of Patrick Meehan, in which, it was alleged, the prosecution case had been “improved” by the planting of evidence. Was there a similarity? “I don’t know,” he said again, “but if there was one witness I was not happy about, it was Mr Bollier, who was deeply unreliable.”'
Saturday 26 December 2015
Claim of Libyan responsibility “may well be codswallop”
Pressure was growing on the Lord Advocate last night to step into the row over the planned release from prison of a key suspect in the Lockerbie bombing who is to be freed under a secret deal between the Iranian and German governments.
Dr Jim Swire, spokesman for the 270 victims of the disaster, said he firmly believed the man at the centre of the diplomatic row, Palestinian terrorist Hafez Dalkamoni and his gang, were the prime movers behind the bombing.
Dr Swire, who lost his daughter Flora in the Lockerbie disaster, said Dalkamoni should not be released from his German prison cell until a full investigation into his involvement in Lockerbie was carried out and a full team of Scottish police officers were allowed to interview him.
In light of the new developments Labour MP Tam Dalyell has written to the Lord Advocate, Lord Mackay of Drumadoon, making it clear that freeing Dalkamoni will seriously undermine efforts to find out who was responsible for the disaster.
Mr Dalyell's letter asks five questions of the Lord Advocate including whether he would talk to the German authorities before the release of Dalkamoni, whether the Germans had contacted Scottish police about his release, and whether the Government would now be in touch with the German government on the matter.
Dalkamoni and his accomplice, Abdel Ghadanfar, led a 14-strong Palestinian cell arrested in Frankfurt weeks before the disaster on December 21, 1988.
Dr Swire, who had made extensive inquiries into the case, said a tape recorder made into a bomb was found in the boot of Dalkamoni's car. The timing mechanism was set in motion by a drop in atmospheric pressure, conditions only to be found in an aircraft as it attains altitude.
Dalkamoni and Ghadanfar were held in custody but the other members of the cell were released and Dr Swire said he believed they were involved in planting a suitcase laden with explosives on the jet at Frankfurt airport.
Dalkamoni was finally jailed in 1991 for 15 years for trying to blow up an American military train but as part of the secret deal with Iran will be released soon after serving less than a third of his sentence.
His accomplice in the plot to blow up the train, Abdel Ghadanfar, who was also arrested at Frankfurt airport, was jailed for 12 years and released in secret last year.
The controversial German deal with Iran follows a visit by their intelligience chief, Ali Fallahian, to meet his German counterpart, Bernd Schmidbauer, in late 1993.
Last night Dr Swire and Mr Dalyell called for immediate action by the Lord Advocate to try and halt the release of Dalkamoni. Both said it was vital that he was interviewed by Scottish police.
Dr Swire said the Government claim that two Libyans were behind the bombing “may well be codswallop”.
Despite the Government insistence of the case against the Libyan pair, he said he firmly believed that Dalkamoni and his gang were heavily involved in the bombing.
A Scottish Office spokesman said last night that once they had seen the contents of Mr Dalyell's letter they would respond to it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)