More international pressure on UK & USA over Lockerbie trial intransigence

[On this date in 1998 The Pan Am 103 Crash Website edited by Safia Aoude carried a report on a meeting of the United Nations Security Council to consider renewing sanctions against Libya. The report reads in part:]

The Security Council on Friday regrettably retained without change the sanctions imposed on Libya since 1992 for failing to hand over two suspects in the 1988 midair bombing of a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, which killed 270 people.

But, at the request of Arab and African countries, council members agreed during private consultations earlier this week to hold a full-scale debate on March 20 on the Libya sanctions in light of a recent World Court decision. Last Friday, the International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled it had jurisdiction to hear Libyan arguments that the 1971 Montreal civil aviation convention allows the suspects to be put on trial in Libya and that Britain and the United States are acting unlawfully in insisting on their extradition to one or other of those countries.

London and Washington played down the ruling as a technicality. Tripoli called it a victory and Libyan revolutionary leader Muammar Gaddafi, in a speech last Monday, urged the Security Council to suspend the sanctions. Despite support for Libya among some council members, the sanctions remain in force unless the council takes a specific decision to ease them. Such a resolution would need a minimum of nine votes to be adopted and could be vetoed by the United States and Britain, as permanent council members.

Libya, backed by Arab, African and many other nonaligned countries, has long been pressing for the two suspects to be tried at a so-called neutral venue, saying they could not get a fair trial in Britain or the United States where the two alleged intelligence agents have both been indicted.

Friday's closed-door review of the sanctions, which include an arms and air embargo and the downgrading of diplomatic relations, was the 18th in a series conducted every 120 days. The initial sanctions were tightened in 1993 with a freeze on some Libyan assets abroad and a ban on some types of equipment used in oil terminals and refineries. But they do not affect oil exports or oil drilling equipment of a certain size and fabrication.

Libyan ambassador Abuzed Dorda spoke of the “strong support for my country from all of the international community” except the United States and Britain. “Libya has no problem with the Security Council and the Security Council has no problem with Libya at all,” he said. “The only problem was between his country and the United States and Britain,” he told reporters. (...)

China's deputy UN representative Sheng Guofang expressed regret that “the various sides have still yet to reach consensus” and hoped the council would be able to “take a step forward on this issue.” “China does not favor any kind of sanction against any country, including sanctions on Libya,” he said, expressing support for options put forward by the Arab League and the Organization of African Unity for a trial at a neutral venue.

[A further report reads as follows:]

The Security Council decided on Thursday to hold a full-fledged debate on March 20 on sanctions imposed on Libya since 1992 in light of a recent world court ruling.

But Britain and the United States rejected combining the public meeting, requested by Arab and African states, with the council’s periodic review of sanctions against Libya.

The closed Security Council review went as scheduled on Friday retaining without change the sanctions imposed on Libya since 1992. Friday’s closed-door review of the sanctions, which include an arms and air embargo and the downgrading of diplomatic relations, was the 18th in a series conducted every 120 days.

Libyan ambassador Abuzed Dorda spoke of the “strong support for my country from all of the international community” except the United States and Britain. “Libya has no problem with the Security Council and the Security Council has no problem with Libya at all,” he said. The only problem was between his country and the United States and Britain, he told reporters.

China’s deputy UN representative Sheng Guofang expressed regret that “the various sides have still yet to reach consensus” and hoped the council would be able “to take a step forward on this issue.”

“China does not favour any kind of sanction against any country, including sanctions on Libya,” he said, expressing support for options put forward by the Arab League and the Organization of African Unity for a trial at a neutral venue

Last Friday the Hague-based International Court of Justice ruled it had jurisdiction to hear Libyan arguments that the 1971 Montreal civil aviation convention allows the suspects to be put on trial in Libya and that Britain and the United States are acting unlawfully in insisting on their extradition.

London and Washington have played down the ruling as a technicality but Libya, backed by Arab, African and other nonaligned countries urged the Security Council to suspend the sanctions.

US Senator Robert Menendez 'faces corruption charge'

[This is the headline over a report published today on the BBC News website. It reads in part:]

The US justice department is preparing to bring criminal corruption charges against Democratic Senator Robert Menendez, US media reports say.

The politician from New Jersey is alleged to have used his office to promote the interests of a Democratic donor, in exchange for gifts.

Attorney General Eric Holder has reportedly given prosecutors permission to proceed with charges.

Senator Menendez has labelled the probe a smear campaign.

"I am not going anywhere," he said on Friday at a press conference in New Jersey.

"Let me very clear, very clear. I have always conducted myself appropriately and in accordance with the law."

An official announcement from prosecutors is expected in the coming weeks.

Sen Menendez is one of the highest-ranking Hispanic members of Congress and a former chairman of the Senate's foreign relations committee.

[Senator Menendez has been one of the most high-profile US politicians to intervene in Lockerbie matters. His history in this regard can be followed here.]

Lockerbie analogy drawn about Obama-Netanyahu spat

[The following are excerpts from an article by Allan Gerson (a former US Deputy Assistant Attorney General) headlined The Guts of the Netanyahu-Obama Flare-Up: The White House Versus Congress which was published yesterday in the US edition of the Huffington Post:]

President Obama may be violating Congressional prerogatives in making deals with foreign governments that are unprepared to renounce their allegiance to terrorism. (...)

Congress has a special constitutional interest in this matter. In fulfillment of its prerogatives as the legislative branch it duly passed laws calling on the State Department to assist it in listing foreign governments considered sponsors of terrorism, and it has repeatedly designated Iran as the world's key supporter and sponsor of terrorism, resulting in the death of thousands of Americans as well as huge numbers of foreign nationals. Dealing with any country designated as a state sponsor of terrorism, absent special exemptions, is subject to stringent criminal penalties. This is not to say that the Executive Branch cannot secretly engage in negotiations with states so designated, but it does mean that no deal can be struck with those states that eliminates their subjection to US sanctions unless they are prepared to renounce allegiance to terrorism as an instrument of state policy. Otherwise, it is the Executive Branch that is trampling on the Legislative Branch's legitimate powers.

For example in dealing with Libya, successive US administrations made clear that Libya would first have to renounce terrorism as an instrument of state policy before any agreement could be effectuated that would eliminate US sanctions against Libya imposed after the bombing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in December 1988. (...)

Police media relations chief for Pan Am 103 investigation dies

[What follows is taken from an obituary in today’s edition of The Herald:]

Angus Kennedy, who has died aged 71, was a police officer who became known to journalists throughout Scotland as the head of the former Strathclyde Police Press Office; he was the main spokesman for the force for many years.

Joining the City of Glasgow Police in 1964, he was initially posted to G Division, Govan Police Office, before progressing through the ranks to reach the rank of superintendent in charge of the demanding environment of police and media relations. (...)

His distinguished police career was defined by the catastrophic event on 21st December 1988 when Pan Am flight 103 exploded over Lockerbie killing 270 people sparking the largest murder enquiry in British history.

Although it had occurred in Dumfries and Galloway, it was agreed by both police forces that Strathclyde would coordinate the media, which, as it turned out, was on an unprecedented scale as within 24 hours there were more journalists than police officers in the small Scottish town. He did a remarkable job not only keeping the world's media informed but importantly he dealt sensitively and compassionately with the relatives that made the journey to Lockerbie in the days that followed. Many came from the United States grief stricken but understandably anxious to find out what had occurred. Angus Kennedy took it upon himself to keep them fully informed and guided them carefully into the media spotlight when appropriate. Out of this tragedy he formed many lifelong friendships with relatives from home and abroad all of whom remained ever grateful for his guidance, strength and comfort at a time of such personal grief.

In 1989 in recognition of his services to policing, in particular his outstanding handling of the exceptional pressures in the aftermath of Lockerbie, he was awarded the Queen's Police Medal.

International pressure led UK and USA to agree to neutral venue trial

[What follows is an item headed Libya Sanction Hearings Sought in the UN Security Council posted on this date in 1998 on The Pan Am 103 Crash Website:]

Arab and African countries are urging an open Security Council debate to pressure Britain and Washington to ease sanctions imposed on Libya after the 1988 Pan Am bombing. The 15 council members had been scheduled to review -- and presumably renew -- the sanctions for another 120 days this week. Such reviews are routinely done in closed sessions.

But Arab and African members of the Security Council are urging the current president, Abdoulie Momodou Saleh of Gambia, to postpone the review and schedule an open debate, diplomatic sources said Wednesday on condition of anonymity. That would enable any UN member state to join the discussions.

The United States and Britain could block any decision to lift or ease the sanctions, which were imposed in 1992 to pressure Libyan revolutionary leader Moammar Gadhafi to extradite two suspects in the fatal bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. The bombing killed 270 people. Still, an open debate would draw attention to calls by the Arab League and the Organization of African Unity to lift the sanctions. Libya has proposed sending the two Libyan suspects to a third country for trial. Washington and London insist they be tried in Scotland or the United States.

But a growing number of council members, including Russia, have urged the council to consider Gadhafi's offer. The use of sanctions as a means of pressuring governments has lost favor among many of the 185 UN member states, in part because they cause suffering among populations who often have little influence on their governments' policies. In an attempt to head off the debate, Britain and the United States have asked UN legal officers for a ruling on whether the review must be completed by the end of the week, the sources said.

If so, there would not be enough time under UN rules to organize an open debate.

[RB: Apart from the Arab League and the Organization of African Unity, the Organization of the Islamic Conference and the Non-Aligned Movement were losing patience with the intransigence of the United Kingdom and the United States in the face of Libyan willingness to countenance a trial of Megrahi and Fhimah in a neutral country. Here is the text of a communiqué issued on 25 September 1997 at the conclusion of a meeting of Ministers for Foreign Affairs and Heads of Delegation of the Non-Aligned Movement:] 

73. The Ministers for Foreign Affairs and Heads of Delegation reconfirmed the position of the Movement as contained in paragraph 163 of the Final Document of the Eleventh Summit in Cartagena. They expressed concern at the non-acceptance by the three Western countries of the appeals of regional and international organizations and their efforts to reach a peaceful settlement based on the principles of international law. They also affirmed that the measures imposed on Libya are no longer justifiable, and urged the Security Council to expeditiously review the air embargo and the other measures imposed on Libya with a view to lifting them. They further underlined that the escalation of the crisis, the threat to impose additional sanctions and the use of force as a means of conducting relations among States are a violation of the Charter of the United Nations and the principles of the Non-Aligned Movement. They reiterated their support for the proposals submitted jointly by the Organization of African Unity and the League of Arab States, as contained in the declaration of the 65th regular session of the Council of Ministers of the Organization of African Unity held in Tripoli from 24-28 February 1997. These proposals are as follows:

Option 1: To hold the trial of the two suspects in a third and neutral country to be determined by the Security Council.

Option 2: To have the two suspects tried by Scottish judges at the International Court of Justice ICJ at the Hague, in accordance with Scottish law.

Option 3: To establish a special criminal tribunal at the ICJ headquarters in the Hague to try the two suspects.

They called for refraining from resorting to the imposition of sanctions unless a real threat to international peace and security exists and only after all other peaceful means for settling the dispute have been exhausted. They also called for the refraining from adopting measures in the economic, financial, transportation and communication fields, due to their serious and inhumane effects on the people and should reflect the views of the General Assembly. The General Assembly is the only forum that reflects the position of all Member states. Where the imposition of sanctions is inevitable, they should be limited in their duration. After which, a decision should be made whether a consensus for their renewal exists and also serious consideration should be given to lift similar sanctions that are in place.

[RB: It was this erosion of international support for continuation of sanctions against Libya that motivated the UK and USA reluctantly to agree to a neutral venue trial in August 1998, some four years and seven months after my proposal had been accepted by the Libyan Government and the suspects’ defence team.]

Giving Scottish Government perfect excuse to do nothing

What follows is excerpted from an item originally posted on this blog on this date in 2012:

Let Megrahi's abandoned appeal be revived to allow new evidence

[This is the headline over a letter from Iain A D Mann in today’s edition of The Herald.  It reads as follows:]

I welcome Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill's assurance to the Holyrood Parliament that the Scottish Government is anxious to publish in full the report of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) into the Camp Zeist trial of the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi and its concerns about the safeness of his conviction ("Let us see reasons for appeal on Megrahi conviction", The Herald, March 1). (...)

However, the most important part of Mr MacAskill's Holyrood statement was his assertion that there is a mechanism by which Megrahi's abandoned second appeal could be revived, even posthumously. Mr MacAskill was adamant that either SCCRC or Megrahi's family were entitled to ask the High Court to resurrect the appeal, and that the court has the power to do so.

As far as I know, this is the first time this has been officially stated. In view of recent revelations and widespread public concern, it is difficult to believe that the High Court would deny such a request. The revived appeal would allow the new evidence, and also the critical information previously withheld from the defence, to be given in open court and tested under oath.

[Megrahi's abandoned appeal cannot be revived. There is no legal mechanism for this to happen. What could happen, and what Kenny MacAskill was referring to in his parliamentary statement, is a further application to the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission. But what Mr MacAskill signally failed to mention is  that legislation that he himself promoted (section 7 of the Criminal Procedure (Legal Assistance, Detention and Appeals) (Scotland) Act 2010 -- the "Cadder Act") places significant new hurdles in the path of any such application. Before granting any such application the SCCRC must be satisfied that an appeal is in the interests of justice and specifically now "must have regard to the need for finality and certainty in the determination of criminal proceedings". And even if the SCCRC grants the application, under the Cadder Act the High Court can refuse to hear the appeal if it believes that it is not in the interests of justice that any appeal arising from the reference should proceed. In determining this matter the High Court is directed that it "must have regard to the need for finality and certainty in the determination of criminal proceedings".

Accordingly, contrary to the impression that Mr MacAskill sought to create in the Scottish Parliament, a further appeal by members of Mr Megrahi's family (or by relatives of Lockerbie victims such as Dr Jim Swire) is not something that can be readily and easily brought about.  Kenny MacAskill's intervention is, in my view, nothing more than a transparent diversionary tactic designed to give the Scottish Government the perfect excuse to do nothing about the scandal of the Megrahi conviction. We must not allow the tactic to succeed.]

The last two paragraphs were my comment at the time. There is now a further application before the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission. But its path is not a smooth one.

Andrew Fulton, MI6 and Lockerbie

On this date seven years ago the rôle of Andrew Fulton in the Lockerbie saga was recalled in the context of his appointment as chairman of the Conservative Party in Scotland:

Andrew Fulton: is he a professor?

The Sunday Herald reports that Andrew Fulton's CV, issued to the press when he was appointed chairman of the Conservative Party in Scotland, claims that he is a visiting professor at Glasgow University's School of Law. The university denies this. The article reads in part:

"The new chairman of the Scottish Tories has become embroiled in a row over his CV after false claims were made about his academic credentials.

"Andrew Fulton, a former MI6 spy who was appointed by the Conservatives on Friday, was hailed as a 'visiting professor' at Glasgow University's school of law.

"But a spokesman for the university rebutted the claims, saying: 'Mr Fulton is not associated with the University of Glasgow's law school and is not entitled to call himself a professor.' Fulton, 64, took up the post as the Scottish Tories' top official last week and received endorsements from Conservative leaders David Cameron and Annabel Goldie.

"The biography supplied to the media claimed he had read law at Glasgow University and was 'now visiting professor at his alma mater's school of law'.

"But Fulton, who was a government diplomat for 30 years, was only briefly a visiting professor at the university between 1999 and 2000. He worked in the university's law school at the Lockerbie Trial Briefing Unit until he was dropped from his post when he was unmasked as an ex-spook.

"Visiting professors lose their title after leaving a university, but the academic status symbol has somehow followed Fulton in his business career."

The full article can be read here.

An article in The Herald the previous day had contained the following:

The former agent, who was born in Rothesay on the Isle of Bute, also brings his own baggage to the post: his unmasking as an MI6 operative led to him stepping down in 2000 as an adviser to Glasgow University's briefing unit which advised the media about the Lockerbie bombing trial amid speculation - which he strongly denied - that he had a competing agenda.

[Coincidentally, another player in the Lockerbie saga is currently chairman of the Conservative party in Scotland. That is Richard Keen QC who successfully defended Lamin Fhimah at the Zeist trial.]

Arab reaction to World Court Lockerbie judgement in favour of Libya

[The following are two items dated 1 March 1998, taken from The Pan Am 103 Crash Website which was edited by Safia Aoude:]

Cairo, 1 March 1998: The head of the Arab League on Saturday welcomed the International Court of Justice decision that it had jurisdiction in Libya's dispute with Britain and the United States over a 1988 airliner bombing. "This declaration from the court affirms the sound Arab position that calls for the trial to be in a neutral country,'' said a statement by Secretary-General Esmat Abdel-Meguid. Separately, Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Moussa told reporters that the procedural move was an "important step.''

The Libyan foreign minister, Umar Mustafa al-Muntassir, held talks in Cairo on Sunday with Arab League Secretary General Esmat Abdel Meguid to discuss what action to take within the United Nations Security Council on the Lockerbie crisis after the International Court of Justice judgment that it could decide where the two Lockerbie suspects should be tried (...)

Meguid said the meeting would be followed "by intensive consultations and meetings until the type of future action towards the settlement of this international crisis is defined."

"Legally speaking, the ICJ ruling pronouncing its jurisdiction to hear Libyan complaints against Britain is a major development," Meguid was quoted as saying. "It means that the Libyan request was honoured, while the British and US rejection was turned down."

Al Muntasir said the meeting was aimed at coordinating the Arab League-Libya stand over recent developments. "A comprehensive Libyan plan was amended to conform to these developments," he said, adding that he had discussed the amendments with the secretary general. He expressed the hope that Libya's coordination with the Arab League, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) would help achieve a unified international stand against "the injustices Libya was suffering within the UN Security Council as well as outside it."

-----

Tripoli, 1 March 1998: The lawyer of the two Libyan suspects wanted in the Lockerbie bombing said Saturday he still backed a trial in a neutral country even though a ruling by the International Court of Justice was a step toward confirming Libya's jurisdiction. "It is a ruling in the right direction...and I am almost certain that the final ruling will be in line with the 1971 Montreal convention which means that Libya's judiciary is competent to hear the case and is right to refuse to hand over the suspects,'' Ibrahim Legwell, lawyer of the two suspects, told Reuters by telephone from Tripoli.

"It is our interest and that of the families of the bombing victims that there be a trial. That's why we support a neutral venue,'' he said. “We had rejected to hand over the two suspects to the United States or Britain because it was unlawful and also we were certain that they wouldn't get a fair trial there. We know that a trial in Libya would also be suspect. The reasonable solution is a trial in a neutral country,” he said.

"Will the trial bring out the truth? Is it really meant to?"

[What follows is taken from a long report headlined What really happened on Flight 103? which was published in The Guardian on this date in 2000:]

The Maid of the Seas had arrived in Heathrow at 12.10pm from San Francisco and had parked by Terminal 3. It was here that Jim MacQuarrie would take over from another pilot. The 55-year-old captain was an experienced pilot and a veteran of 10,910 flight hours, including 4,107 on a B-747.

While the security forces of an airport are responsible for checking passengers and their hand luggage for dangerous objects, it is the duty of each airline to examine luggage that is stored in the freight section. At Heathrow, suitcases are examined with X-rays - but only those that are checked in at the airport.

Since Flight 103 had officially begun its journey in Frankfurt, luggage originating from there was not checked again. The Boeing 727 that came from Frankfurt was parked at Position 16, directly next to the jumbo bound for New York. Workers unloaded the luggage container from the smaller jet and stored it in the belly of the Maid of the Seas.

About 30 tons of freight was placed in the fuselage of the jumbo and over 108 tons of highly flammable kerosene lapped around in its tanks. The flight now weighed 323 tons and there were 259 people on board. (...)

The people of Lockerbie managed the catastrophe with laudable skill. Although the most important water line was broken, the fire department was able to put out all the fires within seven and a half hours. It is a region where milk production is the primary industry and milk wagons were quickly filled with water and driven to the many burning pieces of wreckage.

The first corpses were brought to the town hall, but people then started bringing them to the hockey stadium because it was the only place large and cool enough to store so many bodies.

The county's police force, the smallest in Scotland, was quickly reinforced. Normally only four policemen worked in the Lockerbie region, but by Thursday morning there were 1,100 working alongside 1,000 other soldiers, firemen and volunteers. But even a force of this size could not prevent the first ghoulish sightseers from blocking the narrow country roads the next day.

At about 10am on the Thursday, two boys who were driving a tractor across a field on their father's farm near Tundergarth found both of the orange metal boxes containing the flight data.

Search teams would comb through much of the 2,190 square kilometres of the county with the help of helicopters, airplanes and even spy satellites. But they would be unable to locate the bodies of seven of the passengers, as well as about 10 per cent of the plane. (...)

In the summer of 1989, British investigators came on to a hot trail. Of 11,000 pieces of cloth found in the wreckage, several dozen scraps had carried traces of explosive. One of these fragments carried a label that said 'Malta Trading Company'. When Manfred Klink, a criminal investigator for Germany's BKA, learned about this, he checked documentation in Frankfurt and found a computer printout showing that a suitcase originating in Malta had been transferred to Flight 103. Then three officials from Scotland Yard, the FBI and the BKA travelled to Malta, found the firm that had manufactured the piece of clothing carrying the label and finally found out where it was sold: a boutique called Mary's House in the port of Sliema. Tony Gauci, owner of the shop, remembered a customer who had bought three pairs of pyjamas and a pair of checked brown trousers in late November, early December.

That customer stood out in Gauci's memory because he had paid so little attention to the size and prices of the garments. The man was of Arabic descent and, judging by his accent, probably a Libyan. (...)

In the summer of 1991, a man presented himself to US authorities and turned out to be a star witness, someone who might prove to be more useful than all of the chemical analyses and microscopic searches carried out so far. Abdel Madshid Jiacha was a former Libyan secret agent who had formerly been an assistant to the station chief of Libyan Arab Airlines at the Malta airport. He implicated two of his colleagues with the crime of Lockerbie - and he gave details. (...)

After months of questioning Jiacha, the FBI and Scotland Yard surprised the world's press with a totally new version of events. According to the new announcement, the attack on the Pan Am jumbo had been carried out by two Libyan secret agents: Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, born on 1 April 1952, and Amin Chalifa Fhimah, born on 4 April 1956.

Jiacha said he had observed these two men as they loaded the suitcase containing the bomb on to the plane in Malta that was bound for Frankfurt. He said his government had ordered the attack as revenge for the US bombing of Tripoli and Benghazi in 1986. Libya rejected all of the charges and refused to turn over the two accused men. In response, the UN placed several embargoes on Libya at the request of the US and Britain. All air traffic to and from Libya was forbidden, a blockade was put on Libyan assets held abroad and no Libyan exports were allowed to be received. Libya eventually said it was ready to turn over its two citizens, but only to a 'neutral' country.

Robert Black, a law professor at the University of Edinburgh, made a compromise proposal in 1994 that was long rejected by all sides but which was finally accepted after tensions between Libya and the rest of the world had cooled: a Scottish court would judge the two suspects, but the trial would take place in the Netherlands, the headquarters of the International Court of Justice. (...)

Eleven years after the mass murder of Lockerbie, a trial is set to take place that will be unique in the history of jurisprudence: Britain is organising and paying for a trial that will take place under Scottish law, but without a jury, on Dutch soil.

Libya turned over the suspects on 5 April last year: they are the sole suspects. No one is implicating the Gadaffi regime, even though the Scottish prosecutors themselves take it for granted that the two agents were working for their government. The defence has asked that the start of the trial be delayed until 3 May 2000.

And it is highly possible that the prosecutors will not be successful amid growing doubts about three weaknesses in the case.

The first involves the fragment of the timing device that was found in the wreckage of the plane and that led US authorities to suspect Libyan agents in the first place. The Swiss manufacturer of the device has since said that the device found at Lockerbie was not the type that he had delivered to Libya in the past. Furthermore, the FBI forensic researcher who first examined the fragment has since been fired - for falsifying laboratory data in high-profile cases.

The second weakness of the case involves the Malta connection. The boutique owner Tony Gauci has been questioned 16 times, but has never clearly identified the Libyan agent thought to have visited him. At the time of his alleged visit, the Libyan was 14 years younger than the man first described by Gauci. The boutique owner still maintains that Mohammed Abu Talb of the PFLP-GC is more likely to have been the man who visited his store.

The third and major weakness of the case appears to be the star witness. Jiacha moved to the US from Malta after the attack and offered help to the FBI in 1991. The FBI then took him into its witness protection programme and paid him a reward.

But several witnesses claim that he had already made contact with the US Embassy in Valletta, Malta in August 1988 - four months before the attack. At that point, he gave a detailed report of the activities of the Libyan secret service on Malta. It was only after considerable pressure from the defendants' lawyers that the US admitted that he had made contact with the CIA in 1988. This raises serious questions about the reliability of the witness who is the major connection between a purchase of clothing in Malta and the explosion in Lockerbie. (...)

Will the trial bring out the truth? Is it really meant to? What is certain is that the prosecution's case is inconsistent. For if both suspects were working as Libyan secret agents, as the prosecution maintains, then Gadaffi, as Libya's chief of state, must be implicated. 'This trial is meant to accomplish one thing: to bring the entire case to a close,' said one participant, who weighed his words very carefully. 'No one has any interest any longer in a public solution of the problem; neither Gadaffi nor the US. But all parties have to go through with this trial to save face. This is not about law but about politics - and it has been all along.'