Moussa Koussa allowed to leave UK

[What follows is excerpted from a report in The Guardian on this date in 2011:]

Families of the victims of the Lockerbie bombing have accused the British government of "betrayal" after it allowed Moussa Koussa, the former Libyan foreign minister, to leave the UK to attend an international conference.

Koussa, who defected to Britain at the end of last month, was en route to Doha in Qatar on Tuesday, where an international conference on the future of Libya is to be held with representatives from the Benghazi-based opposition.

He is expected to return to the UK after the conference, but is free to travel as he pleases.

Brian Flynn, the brother of JP Flynn, who died in the 1988 attack and now organises the Victims of Pan Am 103 Incorporated campaign group in New York, said the UK authorities had "crossed a line" by allowing Koussa to attend the conference and thereby suggest he is a peace negotiator rather than, as they believe, a key instigator of the bombing.

"I think the British are being played by him … he has convinced them he can be valuable in this process, but he is not the suave diplomat in the suit sitting on the sidelines, he is one of the key guys who mastermined [the bombing of] Pan Am flight 103," Flynn said.

"He is a stated enemy of the British government. Our feeling is that the British government gave a nod to Lockerbie by questioning him two days before this conference, but that feels disingenuous. The Scottish and American prosecutors on Lockerbie are being betrayed by the politicians and the diplomats. Cameron has been good on Libya, but this sounds an awful lot like Tony Blair is back in charge." (...)

It is understood Koussa spent a week being debriefed by MI6 at a safehouse before being allowed to go free. He was questioned by Dumfries and Galloway police about the 1988 bombing, in which 270 people died, though was he was not a suspect.

William Hague, the foreign secretary, had insisted that Koussa would not be given immunity from prosecution.

He was helped to defect by MI6 after leaving Tripoli for Tunisia on what was initially described as a private visit.

Jean Berkley, co-ordinator of the UK Families Flight 103 group, who lost her 29-year old son Alistair when the Pan Am flight was blown up in mid-air, said she was mystified by the decision to let Koussa travel.

"It is very unexpected," she said. "Is he the basis of a new Libyan opposition, or what? He doesn't seem a very suitable person. Our aim is always to get more of the truth and we want a full public inquiry. Koussa must have some interesting knowledge. It is hard to know what to make of it. We will wait and see and watch with interest." (...)

Koussa's links to the UK go back to the period when he was deputy foreign minister in the mid-1990s and was involved in talks that revealed the Gaddafi regime's past support for the IRA. He was head of Libya's foreign intelligence service in the 1990s – after the Lockerbie bombing. He was also involved in still inconclusive talks about the 1984 murder of Constable Fletcher.

In 2003 he played a pivotal role in talks about surrendering Libya's programme for weapons of mass destruction – the decision which paved the way for Gaddafi's temporary rehabilitation with the west. In 2009 he took part in negotiations over the controversial return home of the convicted Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.

The neutral venue proposal

[On this date in 1994 I was in Tripoli. Here’s my explanation of how it came about:]

I first became involved in the Lockerbie affair in early 1993.  I was approached by representatives of a group of British businessmen whose desire to participate in major engineering works in Libya was being impeded by the UN sanctions.  They asked if I would be prepared to provide (on an unpaid basis) independent advice to the government of Libya on matters of Scottish criminal law,  procedure and evidence with a view (it was hoped) to persuading them that their two citizens would obtain a fair trial if they were to surrender themselves to the Scottish authorities.  This I agreed to do, and submitted material setting out the essentials of Scottish solemn criminal procedure and the various protections embodied in it for accused persons.

In the light of this material, it was indicated to me that the Libyan government was satisfied regarding the fairness of a criminal trial in Scotland but that since Libyan law prevented the extradition of nationals for trial overseas, the ultimate decision on surrender for trial would have to be one taken voluntarily by the accused persons themselves, in consultation with their independent legal advisers.  For this purpose a meeting was convened in Tripoli in October 1993 of the international team of lawyers which had already been appointed to represent the accused.  This team consisted of lawyers from Scotland, England, Malta, Switzerland and the United States and was chaired by the principal Libyan lawyer for the accused, Dr Ibrahim Legwell.  The Libyan government asked me to be present in Tripoli while the team was meeting so that the government itself would have access to independent Scottish legal advice should the need arise.  However, the Libyan government expectation was clearly that the outcome of the meeting of the defence team would be a decision by the two accused voluntarily to agree to stand trial in Scotland.

I am able personally to testify to how much of a surprise and embarrassment it was to the Libyan government when the outcome of the meeting of the defence team was an announcement that the accused were not prepared to surrender themselves for trial in Scotland. [RB: Incidentally, the Libyan government minister who broke the news to me and whose embarrassment was so obvious was Moussa Koussa.]  

In the course of a private meeting that I had a day later with Dr Legwell, he explained to me that the primary reason for the unwillingness of the accused to stand trial in Scotland was their belief that, because of unprecedented pre-trial publicity over the years, a Scottish jury could not possibly bring to their consideration of the evidence in this case the degree of impartiality and open-mindedness that accused persons are entitled to expect and that a fair trial demands.  A secondary consideration was the issue of the physical security of the accused if the trial were to be held in Scotland.  Not that it was being contended that ravening mobs of enraged Scottish citizens would storm Barlinnie prison, seize the accused and string them up from the nearest lamp posts.  Rather, the fear was that they might be snatched by special forces of the United States, removed to America and put on trial there (or, like Lee Harvey Oswald, suffer an unfortunate accident before being put on trial).

The Libyan government attitude remained, as it always had been, that they had no constitutional authority to hand their citizens over to the Scottish authorities for trial.  The question of voluntary surrender for trial was one for the accused and their legal advisers, and while the Libyan government would place no obstacles in the path of, and indeed would welcome, such a course of action, there was nothing that it could lawfully do to achieve it. (...)

Having mulled over the concerns expressed to me by Dr Legwell in October 1993, I returned to Tripoli and on 10 January 1994 presented a letter to him suggesting a means of resolving the impasse created by the insistence of the governments of the United Kingdom and United States that the accused be surrendered for trial in Scotland or America and the adamant refusal of the accused to submit themselves for trial by jury in either of these countries.  This was a detailed proposal, but in essence its principal elements were: that a trial be held outside Scotland, ideally in the Netherlands, in which the governing law and procedure would be that followed in Scottish criminal trials on indictment but with this major alteration, namely that the jury of 15 persons which is a feature of that procedure be replaced by a panel of judges who would have the responsibility of deciding not only questions of law but also the ultimate question of whether the guilt of the accused had been established on the evidence beyond reasonable doubt.

In a letter to me dated 12 January 1994, Dr Legwell stated that he had consulted his clients,  that this scheme was wholly acceptable to them and that if it were implemented by the government of the United Kingdom the suspects would voluntarily surrender themselves for trial before a tribunal so constituted.  By a letter of the same date the Deputy Foreign Minister of Libya stated that his government approved of the proposal and would place no obstacles in the path of its two citizens should they elect to submit to trial under this scheme.

UK-Libya rapprochement following the Lockerbie trial

[What follows is excerpted from an article headlined Gaddafi, Britain, UK and US: A secret, special and very cosy relationship that was published in The Independent on Sunday on 4 September 2011. An important event in the post-Lockerbie rapprochement occurred on 16 December 2003:]

Most of the papers were found at the private offices of Moussa Koussa, the foreign minister, regime security chief and one of Gaddafi's chief lieutenants, on Friday afternoon. (...)

Mr Koussa, who defected after the February revolution and spent time in the UK, left to take up residence in the Gulf after demands that he face police questioning over the murder of Libyan opposition figures in exile, the Lockerbie bombing and the killing of the policewoman Yvonne Fletcher. In a sign of the importance of the British connection, MI6 merited two files in Mr Koussa's office, while the CIA had only one. UK intelligence agencies had played a leading role in bringing Gaddafi's regime in from the cold.

The documents reveal that British security agencies provided details about exiled opposition figures to the Libyans, including phone numbers. Among those targeted were Ismail Kamoka, freed by British judges in 2004 because he was not regarded as a threat to the UK's national security. MI6 even drafted a speech for Gaddafi when he was seeking rapprochement with the outside world with a covering note stressing that UK and Libyan officials must use "the same script". (...)

Britain's extraordinary rekindling of relations with Libya did not start as Mr Blair sipped tea in a Bedouin tent with Gaddafi, nor within the walls of the Travellers Club in Pall Mall – although this "summit of spies" in 2003 played a major role. It can be traced back to a 1999 meeting Mr Blair held with the man hailed as one of the greatest to have ever lived: Nelson Mandela, in South Africa.

Mr Mandela had long played a key role in negotiations between Gaddafi, whom he had hailed as a key opponent of apartheid, and the British government. Mr Mandela first lobbied Mr Blair over Libya in October 1997, at a Commonwealth heads of government meeting in Edinburgh. Mr Mandela was pressing for those accused of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing to be tried outside Scotland. In January 1999, Mr Mandela, during a visit by Mr Blair to South Africa, actively lobbied the PM on behalf of Gaddafi, over sanctions imposed on Libya and the Lockerbie suspects.

UN sanctions were suspended in April 1999 when Gaddafi handed over the two Lockerbie suspects, including Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who was eventually convicted of the bombing. Libya also accepted "general responsibility" for the death of Yvonne Fletcher. Both moves allowed the Blair government to begin the long process of renewing ties with Libya.

Within a couple of years, the issue of persuading the Gaddafi regime to turn itself from pariah into international player surged to the forefront of the British government's agenda. It was during this time, according to the documents found in Mr Koussa's office, that MI6 and the CIA began actively engaging with Libyan intelligence chiefs. But it was a key meeting on 16 December 2003, at the Travellers Club, that would put the official UK – and US – stamp on Gaddafi's credibility. Present were Mr Koussa, then head of external intelligence for Libya, and two Libyan intelligence figures; Mr Blair's foreign affairs envoy, Sir Nigel Sheinwald, and three MI6 chiefs; and two CIA directors. Mr Koussa's attendance at the meeting in central London was extraordinary – at the time he had been banned from entering Britain after allegedly plotting to assassinate Libyan dissidents, and so was given safe passage by MI6.

Mr Koussa's pivotal role at the Travellers Club casts light on how, following his defection from Gaddafi's regime during the initial Nato bombing campaign earlier this year, he was able to slip quietly out of the country. Two days after the 2003 meeting, Mr Blair and Gaddafi held talks by telephone; and the next day, 19 December, the announcement about Libya surrendering its WMD was made by Mr Blair and President Bush.

In March 2004, Mr Blair first shook hands with Gaddafi in his Bedouin tent. The pair then met again in May 2007, shortly before Mr Blair left office.

A response to the Dornstein documentary

[What follows is a commentary by Dr Kevin Bannon on Ken Dornstein’s documentary as broadcast on BBC Channel 4:]

I am loath to disparage an investigation by anyone who lost immediate family in such an atrocity as the bombing of Pan Am103. However, notwithstanding his otherwise pertinent observations, I think that John Ashton (in his recent blog) has been remarkably genteel in his response to Ken Dorntein’s pseudo-investigative documentary Lockerbie: My Brother’s Bomber. Dornstein’s faith in the conviction of al-Megrahi appears unshakeable as does his implicit belief that the co-accused, Fhimah was freed on a technicality.

To summarise his film, its recurring focus is the video of al-Megrahi’s return to Tripoli airport, over which Dornstein seethes, while he identifies several more potential Lockerbie suspects among the welcoming party. One of these is Abu Agela whose name also turns up in files found in Tripoli and in former East Berlin archives. Agela is also listed travelling twice on the same plane flights as al-Megrahi. These circumstances are backed by hearsay which identifies Agela as an explosives expert and then link him to the 1986 bombing of Berlin’s La Belle nightclub. To this, I can only add that Ken Dornstein is entitled to his suspicions.

I found more interesting what Musbah Eter had to say, because since his conviction 14 years ago for the La Belle bombing, there had been no apparent comment from him or his 3 accomplices about their convictions. Ken Dornstein gives him ample camera time to explain himself and Eter is shown looking around his old office - not at camera, and not exactly confessing, but thinking aloud, apparently regretting but simultaneously justifying his past:

“...here we conducted state terrorism, surveillance of enemies...and from here we launched the bombing of the Berlin nightclub, from the second floor...carrying with it the destruction and murder of the innocent...  What we did was wrong and I admit it. If I could go back in time I wouldn’t have done it. But the pressure from the state...and the direct orders from the security services...were [sic] the reason why so many Libyan youths were caught up in it.”

Years previously Eter had both admitted and denied having a role in the La Belle bombing as well as implicating his co-accused in court - then denying that too. His cynical mea culpa in the film does little justice to a premeditated act of violence which killed three and maimed and injured many more. Eter offers no explanation or proof of his role and in Ken Dornstein’s film he is not questioned at all on any such details. John Ashton’s recent blog notes Eter’s former CIA associations – it certainly puts the La Belle bomber’s meanders into a kind of perspective.

The film shows the investigating prosecutor in the La Belle case, Detlev Mehlis musing how he had difficulty spelling the name ‘Abugela’ (Abu Agela) “...sorry...I have no idea how to spell Abugela...I would probably spell it like ‘jelly’ or something...” Eter had written down the name for him ‘ABUGELA’ and next to it ‘NEGER’ which Mehlis pronounces “neeger” adding “...but here in German it doesn’t have that negative meaning as in the US.” Mehlis might not find this word negative, but he should know that since the seventies this has been regarded as a derogatory word among most educated Germans.

The Le Belle club specialised in soul music and had been particularly popular with Afro-American servicemen, two of whom were killed along with a Turkish woman - improbable targets by Libya seeking revenge on Washington. A bomb had exploded a week earlier outside Berlin’s German-Arab Friendship offices, (the DAFG), injuring several Arabs. Three Middle Eastern men who had been arrested as the initial suspects in the La Belle bombing were subsequently blamed for this attack; it was said that the motive had been antipathy towards the PLO which they apparently believed the DAFG had represented. However Ahmed Hasi (or Hazi) who placed the DAFG bomb, had no history a political zealot but rather a police record for abusing his wife and drug dealing.

In September 1980, Germany’s deadliest bombing attack on civilians since World War II killed 13 people at the ‘Oktoberfest’– a popular family festival held annually. The device had exploded prematurely, killing the bomber, Gundolf Köhler - a member of a Wehrsportgruppe Hoffmann - a banned neo-Nazi party. Had this bomb plant gone according to plan, one wonders who might have been blamed for the attack – targeting ordinary families and Bavarian provincial traditions – obviously not the far-right.

Ken Dornstein chooses to include a short news clip from al-Megrahi’s deathbed, an interview in which al-Megrahi, in his intermediate English, says that his name had been ‘exaggerated’ - Al-Megrahi wouldn’t have been familiar the words ‘slandered’ or ‘besmirched’ but in October 2011, his comment went viral in the West’s media, who made the interpretation that al-Megrahi’s role in the bombing plot had been exaggerated – which would have been tantamount to an admission of guilt. Al-Megrahi’s fervent denials of any involvement in the Lockerbie bombing were numerous and un-ambiguous. This ‘exaggerated’ statement was grossly misleading in its original broadcasts but more so in Dornstein’s reiteration of it - especially as in his film, it is presented as al-Megrahi’s final word.

Dornstein is also shown equipping himself with a hidden micro-video camera, having ingratiated himself with Jim Swire in hope of filming al-Megrahi himself – and he toys with the idea of demanding a confession or denial from al-Megrahi. To see Jim Swire - totally oblivious to Dornstein’s ruse - warmly welcomed by al-Megrahi’s son at the front door, before introducing Dornstein (who had to wait in the hall) is galling and acutely dishonest. Jim Swire’s openness and magnanimity is well-known and I would expect he forgave Dornstein – as a fellow-in-grief - but I’m not ashamed to say I wouldn’t have. A conversation afterwards with Jim Swire shows Ken Dornstein nodding ‘sympathetically’ as he listens to Jim Swire’s poignant lament for al-Megrahi - this makes Ken Dornstein look, frankly, two-faced.

An investigation of any kind requires elements such as definition, corroboration, credible testimonials or some kind of logical chain-of-evidence – a testable hypothesis or one that is falsifiable as the late Karl Popper would have described it.

I have no idea who planted the bomb – my emphasis is on who didn’t - a narrower focus and a simpler research problem with a more finite evidence basis.

What follows is all factual:

A - The prime witness

Al-Megrahi was originally linked to the Lockerbie bombing plot based only on the evidence eyewitness Antony Gauci a shopkeeper in Malta. There were at least 10 separate features or conditions pertaining to his evidence about items he had sold to a customer; their total cost; the date of sale; the weather on that day; the appearance and age of the customer etc. Fundamental aspects of each and every one of these evidence items or their conditions changed between the initial statements and the latter ones - changes 100% favourable to the prosecution case. The original evidence thoroughly discounted al-Megrahi as the customer in every aspect.

Within the same general period that Tony Gauci modified his testimony he had ‘expressed an interest in receiving money’ and the police discussed on more than one occasion - not in his presence - the possibility of substantial or immediate cash payments being made to him as an inducement: Example from a police memo: "if a monetary offer was made to Gauci this may well change his view and allow him to consider a witness protection programme...”

After the conviction of al-Megrahi, it became apparent that Tony Gauci received ‘in excess of $2 million’ as a reward for helping with the Lockerbie investigation.

B - The circuit board fragment

A fragment of charred cloth was found near Lockerbie about three weeks after the bombing. The item later yielded a tiny fragment of circuit board which forensic investigators linked to timing devices sold to the Libyan defence forces. To this day it remains unclear what date the crucial piece of circuit board was discovered and who discovered it.

No evidence of explosive residue examination of this item – supposedly the only piece of the explosive device found – was produced at trial or shown to have taken place.

Soon after it was first logged, the label attached to this evidence describing its contents was falsified so that its original description ‘Cloth’ then read ‘Debris’ (falsified – not merely ‘overwritten’).

An existing metallurgy test on this circuit board fragment, establishing that it was constitutionally different from the batch sold to Libya, was not introduced in court. Several years later another more advanced metallurgy test confirmed this – corroborating the elimination of the Libyan link to the explosive device.

False testimony drew al-Megrahi into the Lockerbie bombing indictment and corrupt procedures pertaining to the circuit board fragment nailed his conviction. The only rational explanation for this is that al-Megrahi was fitted-up in a conspiracy by individuals associated with the Lockerbie investigation and/or the subsequent prosecution and trial. It is perhaps no wonder why the Scottish and UK authorities are reticent to have the matter delved into any further.

Entirely un-mentioned in Ken Dornstein’s film is Moussa Koussa, former Libyan foreign minister, principal security adviser to Gaddafi himself, and subject of one of the greatest intelligence coups anywhere since 1945. Koussa, Gaddafi’s right-hand man, had been simultaneously a direct informant to the CIA and to MI6 since at least the 1990’s and almost certainly since the early 80s. In 1980 he had uttered, direct to a reporter of The Times in London, an open threat both to assist the IRA and to liquidate Libyan dissidents abroad – an incrimination of the Libyan regime from which it never recovered. This helps explain, better than anything else, the perception of Libya’s self-destructive international image during the 1980s.

On the 30 March 2011, at a decisive moment in the Libyan uprising, Koussa flew to the UK to be debriefed by MI6 and others – and was then allowed safe-passage to Saudi Arabia – into media silence and luxurious exclusion. This alone establishes that the contradictions surrounding Libya since 1980 are much more likely to lie with Western intelligence services rather than amidst Tripoli’s rubble.

When Ken Dornstein arrived in Tripoli the first time, the city had been shattered – the result of a Bay of Pigs--Contras-type CIA war led by Washington, dressed up, naturally as a popular revolt. This time the CIA had been ‘successful’ because they were backed by NATO air power and had the benefit of digital-age disinformation and news management – not to mention Moussa Koussa’s assistance at the outset. Even the overall casualty figures of this destruction-of-a-nation have been withheld – possibly not even enumerated at all. In either case this is in blatant contravention of universal law – because people, or military personnel, are supposed to know what they are doing and what they have done. The report of the UN Human Rights Council into the Libyan ‘rebellion’ was told by NATO that ‘aircraft flew a total 17,939 armed sorties with a “zero expectation” of death or injury to civilians’. The UN sampled 20 NATO airstrikes and counted 60 civilian deaths attributable to them – and left it at that; ‘Do the math’:  (17,939  ÷ 20)  x  60 = x

At least we know that there were ‘zero’ NATO casualties – “a new highpoint in technological warfare” as one Guardian letter-writer observed. We also know that - however shattered Tripoli was after the CIA and NATO had finished with it – conditions there subsequently worsened.

Lockerbie: My Brother’s Bomber is the second Libya-themed ‘documentary’ in the BBC’s appropriately named Storyville series. Its predecessor earlier this year Mad Dog: Gaddafi’s secret world featured a host of stomach-churning anecdotes - all uncorroborated. These included Gaddafi storing the bodies of his enemies in a fridge so he could gloat over them – in one instance 20 years later; a six year old girl having her lips cut off and bleeding to death for smiling inappropriately in Gaddafi’s presence; that Gaddafi was a rampant racist, and regarded dark-skinned Africans as an inferior people; a boy of about 14 filmed holding an ostensible human heart in his hands and promising to eat it; Gaddafi’s relentless appetite for seducing or raping school children, implicitly of both sexes. The narrative was artfully backed by a soundtrack like a horror film.

By contrast, a snuff-movie featuring the torture to death of Gaddafi himself is perfectly genuine. The Sun newspaper devoted a whole front-page to the image of his paraded corpse with the headline: “That’s for Lockerbie”.

It is profoundly disturbing that even the once ‘independent’ BBC broadcasts propagandist items such as Storyville as historical documentary. These will help authorise and sustain the successive armed interventions in the Middle East led by the United States under the false guises of ‘humanitarian assistance’ and ‘national security’.

Ken Dornstein’s film is not the core of the problem; it is the enormous international media backing the film has received. I suggest Ken Dornstein read Manufacturing Consent (Herman & Chomsky 1988) – just in case he has any delusions about why his narrative has received such extraordinary publicity.

Why does Lockerbie rhyme with irony?

[This is the headline over an article by Michael Glackin published today by the Lebanese newspaper The Daily Star. It reads as follows:]

Oh the irony. What are we to make of news last week that Scottish prosecutors suddenly want to interview two Libyans they have identified as “new suspects” in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, in which 270 people were killed? The short answer is not much. One reason is that the suspects are hardly new. Both men were of interest to the original investigation in 1991. Abdullah al-Senussi, a former Libyan intelligence chief and brother in law of Moammar Gadhafi, was convicted in absentia by a French court in 1999 after having been found guilty of involvement in the bombing of a French UTA airliner over Niger in 1989. How ironic is that? He is currently on death row in Tripoli for crimes committed by the Gadhafi regime.

The other suspect, Mohammed Abouajela Masud, is currently serving a 10-year sentence in Tripoli for bomb-making. Masud was almost indicted for the Pan Am bombing in 1991, alongside Abdelbaset Ali Megrahi, the former head of security at Libyan Arab Airlines and the only person convicted of the atrocity.

Masud is also thought to have been involved in the bombing of a Berlin discotheque in 1986 frequented by American military personnel. The attack led to US airstrikes against Libya soon thereafter. Ironically, and depending on your point of view, this is what led to the bombing of Pan Am 103.

But the chances of either man appearing in a Scottish court are slim. The Tripoli-based General National Congress, backed by Islamist extremists and not recognized by the West, controls the fate of both men. It’s unlikely they will be extradited, and hard to see anyone volunteering to travel to Tripoli to interview them.

The conviction of Megrahi, who died in 2012, three years after he was released from a life sentence “on compassionate grounds,” was based on the theory that Gadhafi had ordered the bombing in retaliation for U.S. airstrikes against Libya.

Gadhafi admitted responsibility in 2003, but this was always seen as an economically pragmatic move, rather than an admission of guilt. A former Libyan prime minister, Shukri Ghanem, said as far back as 2005 that the decision to accept responsibility was to “buy peace and move forward.”

Another irony is that while the authorities insist the investigation into the bombing remains “ongoing,” the Scottish judiciary recently refused a request from some of the relatives of victims to hear an appeal against Megrahi’s conviction that would have allowed new evidence to be presented in court.

The legal case against Megrahi had more holes in it than Swiss cheese. His early release from jail in 2009, after being convicted of the biggest mass murders in British history, only added to the bad smell around the entire case.

The key witness against Megrahi, Maltese shopkeeper Tony Gauci, was given a $2 million reward for his evidence by the CIA and a place in a witness-protection program. Gauci, who even the Scottish prosecutor who indicted Megrahi described as being “an apple short of a picnic,” is now understood to be living in Australia.

It’s worth remembering that in October 1988, two months before the Pan Am bombing, German police raided an apartment in Frankfurt and arrested several Palestinians. The raid unearthed explosives, weapons and, crucially, a number of radio cassette recorders similar to the one used to detonate the Pan Am 103 bomb. Most of the Palestinians were members of the Syrian-controlled Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command, headed by Ahmad Jibril, a Palestinian former Syrian Army officer. Jibril has spent recent years defending the regime of President Bashar Assad. He was reported to have been killed in August although this has since been denied.

Much of the evidence indicates Jibril and the PFLP-GC carried out the bombing on behalf of Iran and Syria to avenge the July 1988 accidental downing of an Iranian commercial airliner by a US warship, killing 290 people. This is backed up by evidence from the US Defense Intelligence Agency showing that the PFLP-GC was paid $1 million to carry out the bombing. The DIA also claimed that Jibril was given a down payment of $100,000 in Damascus by Iran’s then-ambassador to Syria, Mohammad Hussan Akhari.

Many believe then-Syrian President Hafez Assad’s support for the U.S.-led alliance to oust Iraqi forces from Kuwait in 1991 meant Syria’s role in the bombing was swept under the carpet. It is worth pointing out that Megrahi was not formally indicted by the United States and the United Kingdom until November 1991.

But the PFLP-GC is not the only non-Libyan suspect. The Frankfurt raid also revealed compelling evidence against Muhammad Abu Talib, a former leader of the Palestine People’s Struggle Front. Oddly enough Talib was released from a life sentence he was serving in Sweden for involvement in bomb attacks weeks after Megrahi’s release in 2009.

Finally, given that the authorities remain keen to pursue the Libyan angle, it is odd they spent so little time interviewing Gadhafi’s former spymaster Moussa Koussa when he fled to London as the regime was collapsing in 2011. Koussa, who in the words of one British government official was “up to his neck” in the bombing, spent just three days in London and then flew on to Qatar, where he remains, living on assets that were quietly unfrozen by the West around the same time. Oh the irony.

"I will never understand your motives or your methods"

[In an email of 16 July 2015 addressed to Dr Jim Swire and me, Frank Duggan, President of the US Lockerbie relatives organization Victims of Pan Am Flight 103 Inc wrote: “Prof Black and Dr Swire. Even if you honestly believe that Gadhafi had nothing to do with the Lockerbie bombing, he certainly did enough to lead this list of monsters. I will never understand your motives or your methods.”

The “list of monsters” refers to the Evolution of Evil television series, particularly the programme Gaddafi: Mad Dog of the Middle East.

What follows is the text of Dr Swire’s reply to Mr Duggan, dated 17 July:]

Dear Frank,

I agree with your statement (copied below) that:-

" I (Frank Duggan) will never understand your (Jim Swire's et al) motives or your methods."

My motive is so simple and has been so many times stated that it is clear you are unable to understand that it is simply to know the truth - which includes as much of the truth about what my Government and yours really know as can be forced from their unwilling grasp.

That is my motive: what is yours in maintaining adherence to the story accepted by the Zeist court?

Where were you as the evidence unfolded? Were you there?

I was.

As for my methods they are to question those directly involved wherever possible and make an assessment upon what they say.

Therefore my motive in repeatedly meeting with Gaddafi and other Arab leaders was to see what they had to say and more significantly to try to persuade them to send the accused for trial under Scottish law.

Of course the likes of Nelson Mandela (did you ever meet him? - I did) were of far greater importance than we could ever hope to be, but at least we did our utmost to persuade the late Colonel to send them over.

Did you try to do that?

In the case of Gaddafi I decided that he was inscrutable and that I could never find out what he did or did not know. That is why if you review all that I have said, you will find that since the Zeist trial I have never claimed to know whether he was involved or not, only to being sure (largely courtesy of the Zeist trial evidence) that his man Megrahi was not involved.

I confess that before the trial I believed him to be involved and I wanted his men to be tried, in order to learn the truth. This was wrong in so far as all accused are entitled to a presumption of innocence, but my Government had told me that there was irrefutable evidence about Libyan involvement but none about any other country. I was naive and that is my excuse

As early as February 1989 I had been shown a detailed warning received by the UK Government from the West German BKA in October 1988. It showed that the PFLP-GC of Damascus had perfected bombs which were inert at ground level but, having no user adjustments except an arming plug, on sensing the drop in pressure as an aircraft climbs, they were committed to exploding around 35, plus or minus five, minutes following take off.

Such devices had to be infiltrated at the airport of take off of the target flight, in this case Heathrow: if inserted at Frankfurt they would explode over Europe before reaching Heathrow. All this was repeated with further details by Herr Gobel during the Zeist trial.

Perhaps you remember that the Lockerbie flight lasted 38 minutes from take off?

If you re-examine the evidence led by Mr Bedford, the chief baggage handler at Heathrow, you will see that he reported that two suitcases had been put into the Pan Am baggage container AV4041 with no known security clearance and in his absence, long before the Frankfurt flight had even landed, that no one would admit having put them there, and that one of them was a dark coloured hard sided 'Samsonite type' suitcase occupying the position where the origin of the explosion occurred.

Funny that, it fits the description of the primary suitcase containing the bomb and the court decided without justificatory evidence of any kind that in fact one of the late arriving cases from Frankfurt 'must' have displaced it, apparently using the circular argument that the bomb must have come from Frankfurt.

The point of origin of the explosion can be explored in the Air Accident Investigation Branch report 2/90.

You  might also like to read the book Adequately explained by stupidity? by Morag Kerr which details events at Heathrow.

Of course, the Scottish police/Crown Office had also known from February 1989 that the Heathrow airside security had been broken into 16 hours prior to Lockerbie, but for whatever reason they kept that concealed from the defence and the court.

As the trial progressed we learned that the identifying of Megrahi as the buyer of the famous Maltese clothing depended on the evidence of a man who knew that if his evidence convicted the Libyan he was in line for several million dollars.

Is that a sound basis for reliable evidence do you think?

Then there was the fact, as their Lordships themselves had to admit in their summary, that there simply was no evidence to show how Megrahi  was supposed to have got the bomb on board at Malta.

When I pushed for trial under Scottish criminal law, I believed that the task of the court was to prove a case 'beyond reasonable doubt'.

Do you believe that these proceedings reached that standard?

But of course you will say a fragment of circuit board proved that a long running timer sold to Libya had been used, not one of the cruder fixed run-time devices made in Damascus.

Do you know that that fragment was found by a UK forensic officer within the only Scottish police evidence bag whose label, the court heard, had been illegally tampered with? Could there be reasonable doubt about the authenticity of the bag's contents also?

Do you know that that same forensic officer told the court under oath that the fragment was "similar in all respects" to the boards in the timers owned by Libya?

Have you seen the dated report from him which shows that he knew before giving that evidence that the plating was incompatible?

Have you read the scientific academic reports which confirm that this plating difference could not have been caused by exposure to a Semtex explosion?

In this country we had a philosopher now commonly referred to as 'William of Occam' he was born in 1285 (rather before the Pilgrim Fathers got their act together I fear) in the little Surrey village of Occam.

His best known philosophical statement is nowadays currently rendered along the lines that 'The simplest explanation that fits the known facts is usually the correct one'.

Having studied all the available evidence as best I can I think the bomb was built by Marwhan Khreesat of the PFLP-GC, and put aboard at Heathrow with the dreadful consequences we all know.

William of Occam would no doubt have preferred that conclusion to the complexities of the Megrahi/Malta/Frankfurt scenario.

I am satisfied that the Megrahi/Malta story is nothing more than a fable, because there is far more evidence against it than for it, and that in this case it is wise to follow William's advice.

I wonder what your guess would be as to the origin of the fragment known as PT35b? The realisation that it really could not have come from one of the timers owned by Libya destroys the one anomaly which seemed to genuinely support the Malta hypothesis.

I have not been able to find out what happened between October 1988 when the Germans lost track of at least one of the PFLP-GC type bombs and December 1988 at Heathrow, nor have I been able to discover who broke into Heathrow airside.

I therefore have no idea whether Gaddafi himself was responsible in some way, and that is why I do not claim to know whether he was a guilty party. Study the records again.

You Frank say "Even if you honestly believe that Gaddafi had nothing to do with the Lockerbie bombing, he certainly did enough to lead this list of monsters", I have tried to explain that I do not know whether the late colonel was involved over Lockerbie or not. It looks likely that his right hand man Moussa Koussa probably at least knew of the plot, his body language suggested guilt when I met him, but that would make an even weaker case than the story I heard at Zeist, would it not.

I doubt I shall respond to your emails in future, there is no point if your eyes and ears are closed to fact based discussion, but there are two favours I would ask of you all the same.

1.) I have always been aware that our search for the truth has upset certain US relatives by disturbing what they see as their closure. Of course they would see this email as just 'Swire trotting out the same old arguments again' but it may none the less be upsetting for them to read. Some will have seeds of doubt in their minds aware that the constancy of our position could most easily be explained (though you say you cannot understand it yourself) by having the simplicity of truth; by being in other words correct. I have not found a way to avoid upsetting the US relatives, but if you have their real interests at heart, I think you should not make them read this, instead your time might be better spent in pondering for yourself some of the very real weaknesses of the case we heard at Zeist, perhaps following William of Occam's advice.

2.) I beg you not to encourage 'your' members to hate. The heading "EVOLUTION OF EVIL - Premiering 16th July 2015 on The American Heroes Channel" ... suggests incitement to hate. We have experienced the outpourings of some unfortunate relatives in the form of hatred, hatred for Arabs, hatred for Gaddafi, even hatred for those of us who seek the truth. This is what terrorists do, they thrive on hatred. Every time someone descends to hatred, the terrorists score again, for the consequence of harbouring hatred is destruction of the personal lives of those who harbour it.

No man is simply "AN EVOLUTION OF EVIL" we are all flawed and imperfect, but capable of both good acts and evil ones. I can tell you that Gaddafi was both inscrutable and cyclothymic, but in the running of his country he seems, albeit at terrible cost to his people, to have been rather more effective than the chaos that our Western actions have triggered. following his murder. I fear we do not have the luxury of simplification offered by describing individuals as either pure good or pure evil. The world and we ourselves are far more complex than that.

Of course those who do evil acts like Lockerbie must be brought before the law and agreed punishments administered if found guilty through valid evidence, but you might care to remember the axioms "judge not, that ye be not judged", or perhaps " Send not to ask for whom the bell tolls: it tolls for thee".

[The following are two emailed responses from Mr Duggan:]

1. Dr Swire: there is nothing new in your lengthy email, and no evidence to support any of your theories. Theories are not admissible in court without some proof.

Regards,

Frank Duggan

2. Dr Swire: attached is a review of Hurley's book which recounts the Channel 4 panel discussion we had in London. The moderator was certainly not impartial, but I was able to explain the warnings you have been talking about for 25 years. I would also note that you were defending the Libyans at this point, before the trial and before you had heard any evidence in court. It is not true that you went into that court with an open mind, and there are other family members who recall conversations with you as to the innocence of the Libyans. One family member said that you had all the arguments that had been prepared by Prof Black, who maintains to this day that no court would find the Libyans guilty.

Regards,

Frank Duggan

https://books.google.com/books?id=0TcZMd9TioYC&pg=PA390&dq=Frank+Duggan+Pan+Am+103&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CB4Q6AEwAGoVChMIpoTkwNTixgIVDD4-Ch1Wwwe_#v=onepage&q=Frank%20Duggan%20Pan%20Am%20103&f=false