His long-awaited appeal would have confirmed his innocence

[What follows is an extract from an article by John Pilger that was published on the Information Clearing House website on this date in 2011:]

Gone from the Murdoch press are pejorative "insurgents". The action in Libya, says The Times, is "a revolution... as revolutions used to be". That it is a coup by a gang of Muammar Gaddafi's ex cronies and spooks in collusion with Nato is hardly news. The self-appointed "rebel leader", Mustafa Abdul Jalil, was Gaddafi's feared justice minister. The CIA runs or bankrolls most of the rest, including America's old friends, the Mujadeen Islamists who spawned al-Qaeda.

 

They told journalists what they needed to know: that Gaddafi was about to commit "genocide", of which there was no evidence, unlike the abundant evidence of "rebel" massacres of black African workers falsely accused of being mercenaries. European bankers' secret transfer of the Central Bank of Libya from Tripoli to "rebel" Benghazi by European bankers in order to control the country's oil billions was an epic heist of little interest.

The entirely predictable indictment of Gaddafi before the "international court" at The Hague evokes the charade of the dying "Lockerbie bomber", Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, whose "heinous crime" has been deployed to promote the west's ambitions in Libya. In 2009, al-Megrahi was sent back to Libya by the Scottish authorities not for compassionate reasons, as reported, but because his long-awaited appeal would have confirmed his innocence and described how he was framed by the Thatcher government, as the late Paul Foot's landmark expose revealed. As an antidote to the current propaganda, I urge you to read a forensic demolition of al-Megrahi's "guilt" and its political meaning in Dispatches from the Dark Side: on torture and the death of justice (Verso) by the distinguished human rights lawyer, Gareth Peirce.

The truth was inconvenient

[On this date in 2007 I reproduced on this blog a long article by Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer published the previous day on OhmyNews International. What follows is an excerpt:]

Back to Square One

Let us give Lord Sutherland, Lord Coulsfield and Lord Maclean some credit. After hearing 230 witnesses and studying 621 exhibits during 84 days of evidence, spread over eight months, the three judges of the Lockerbie trial almost got the date of the worst act of terror in the UK correct.

In the first line of the first paragraph of the most expensive verdict in history (￡80 million), they wrote: "At 1903 hours on 22 December 1988 Pan Am flight 103 fell out of the sky." As a matter of fact, Pan Am Flight 103 exploded on Dec 21.

Michael Scharf is an international law expert at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio. Scharf joined the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser for Law Enforcement and Intelligence in April 1989. He was also responsible for drawing up the UN Security Council resolutions that imposed sanctions on Libya in 1992.

"It was a trial where everybody agreed ahead of time that they were just going to focus on these two guys, and they were the fall guys," Scharf wrote.

"The CIA and the FBI kept the State Department in the dark. It worked for them for us to be fully committed to the theory that Libya was responsible. I helped the counter-terrorism bureau draft documents that described why we thought Libya was responsible, but these were not based on seeing a lot of evidence, but rather on representations from the CIA and FBI and the Department of Justice about what the case would prove and did prove."

"It was largely based on this inside guy [Libyan defector Abdul Majid Giaka]. It wasn't until the trial that I learned this guy was a nut-job and that the CIA had absolutely no confidence in him and that they knew he was a liar."

The Magic Luggage

According to the Lockerbie verdict, the bomb was hidden in a Toshiba radio, wrapped in clothes and located in luggage that was mysteriously boarded in Malta.

The court has examined this allegation in depth and the matter occupies 24 paragraphs of the final verdict (§16 to §34). After reviewing all the evidence and testimonies, the three judges came to the following conclusions:

"Luqa airport had a relatively elaborate security system. All items of baggage checked in were entered into the airport computer as well as being noted on the passenger's ticket. After the baggage had passed the sniffer check, it was placed on a trolley in the baggage area to wait until the flight was ready for loading.

"When the flight was ready, the baggage was taken out and loaded, and the head loader was required to count the items placed on board. The ramp dispatcher, the airport official on the tarmac responsible for the departure of the flight, was in touch by radiotelephone with the load control office. The load control had access to the computer and, after the flight was closed, would notify the ramp dispatcher of the number of items checked in. The ramp dispatcher would also be told by the head loader how many items had been loaded; and if there were a discrepancy, the ramp dispatcher would take steps to resolve it.

"In addition to the baggage reconciliation procedure, there was a triple count of the number of passengers boarding a departing flight, that is there was a count of the boarding cards, a count by immigration officers of the number of immigration cards handed in, and a head count by the crew.

"The records relating to KM180 on 21 December 1988 show no discrepancy in respect of baggage. The flight log (production 930) shows that 55 items of baggage were loaded, corresponding to 55 on the load plan.

"On the face of them, these arrangements seem to make it extremely difficult for an unaccompanied and unidentified bag to be shipped on a flight out of Luqa.

"If therefore the unaccompanied bag was launched from Luqa, the method by which that was done is not established, and the Crown accepted that they could not point to any specific route by which the primary suitcase could have been loaded.

"The absence of any explanation of the method by which the primary suitcase might have been placed on board KM180 is a major difficulty for the Crown case."

An internal 1989 FBI memo indicates that there is no indication that unaccompanied luggage was transferred from Air Malta to Pan Am. Law authorities from Malta and Germany came to the same conclusion.

And yet, without any explanation, the judges wrote in the conclusion of the verdict that: "the absence of an explanation as to how the suitcase was taken into the system at Luqa is a major difficulty for the Crown case, but after taking full account of that difficulty, we remain of the view that the primary suitcase began its journey at Luqa." (§ 82)

The Maltese Storekeeper

According to the verdict, Megrahi bought the clothes in which the bomb was wrapped in Sliema, a small town of Malta in the Mediterranean Sea, including the "cloth" in which the fragment was "discovered" by Hayes. At first sight, the "cloth" appears to be part of a Slalom shirt sold in a little shop -- Mary's House -- located on the island.

However, upon closer examination, the "cloth" raises a series of issues. Firstly, the color of the label is incorrect. A blue Slalom shirt label should have blue writing, not brown.

Secondly, the breast pocket size corresponds to a child shirt, not the 16-and-a-half-sized shirt allegedly bought by Megrahi, for the pocket would have been 2 centimeters wider.

Thirdly, German records show the shirt had most of the breast pocket intact, while the evidence shown at Zeist had a deep triangular tear extending inside the pocket.

Lastly, the storekeeper initially told the investigators he never sold such shirts to whoever visited him a few weeks before the Lockerbie tragedy.

Storekeeper Tony Gauci's testimony was pivotal in the case against Megrahi. Gauci gave a series of 19 statements to the police that are fully inconsistent. Yet, the judges found him trustworthy. Allow me to disagree.

On Jan 30, 1990, Gauci stated, "That time when the man came, I am sure I did not sell him a shirt." Then, on Sept 10, 1990, he told the investigators, "I now remember that the man who bought the clothing also bought a Slalom shirt." And to make things worse, two of his testimonies have disappeared.

When Were the Clothes Bought?

According to the verdict, Megrahi bought the clothes on Dec 7, 1989. Gauci remembered that his brother had gone home earlier to watch an evening football game (Rome vs Dresden), that the man came just before closing time (7 pm), that it was raining (the man bought an umbrella) and that the Christmas lights were on.

The game allows for only two dates: Nov 23 or Dec 7. The issue is critical for there is no indication that Megrahi was in Malta on Nov 23, but he is known to have been on the island on Dec 7.

The chief meteorologist of Malta airport testified that it was raining on Nov 23 but not on Dec 7. Yet the judges determined the date as Dec 7. This rather absurd conclusion from the judges raises two other issues.

The Dec 7 Rome-Dresden game was played at 1 pm, not in the evening. What is more, Gauci had previously testified that the Christmas lights were not up, meaning that the date had to be Nov [23].

On Sept 19, 1989, Gauci stated, "The [Christmas] decorations were not up when the man bought the clothing." Then, at the Lockerbie trial, Gauci told the judges that the Christmas lights were on. "Yes, they were … up."

Who Was the Mysterious Buyer?

"We are nevertheless satisfied that his identification, so far as it went, of the first accused as the purchaser was reliable and should be treated as a highly important element in this case," wrote the judges.

In fact, Gauci never identified Megrahi. He merely stated that Megrahi resembles the man to whom he had sold the clothes, but only if he were much older and two inches taller. Gauci, however, had identified another man: Abu Talb.

Talb was a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GL), the terrorist group led by Jibril.

In late October 1988 the senior bomb maker of the PFLP-GC, Marwan Khreesat, was arrested in Frankfurt in the company of Hafez Dalkamoni, the leader of the organization's German cell.

Dalkamoni had met Talb in Cyprus and Malta the week before. In the car the two men used, police found a bomb hidden in a Toshiba radio. Khreesat told the police that he had manufactured five similar improvised explosive devices (IEDs).

Each device Khreesat had built was triggered by a pressure gauge that activated a timer -- range 0 to 45 minutes -- when the plane reached a cruising altitude of 11,000 meters. The timers of all recovered bombs were set on 30 minutes. It takes about 7 minutes for a 747 to reach cruising altitude. Pan Am 103 exploded 38 minutes after take-off from London.

German police eventually recovered four of the IEDs Khreesat had built. No one seems to know what happened to the fifth one, which was never recovered. When police raided Talb's apartment in Sweden, they found his appointment notebook. Talb had circled one date: Dec 21.

Contrary to Jibril's statement, and surely he must know better, a bomb triggered by a pressure gauge set at 11,000 meters would not have detonated during the Frankfurt to London flight as the airliner does not reach cruising altitude on such a short flight.

Then again, such a device would not have detonated at all if it had been located in the luggage area, as the hold is at the pressure of the passengers' zone and never drops below the pressure equivalent of 2,400 meters.

This is why when the judges were presented with the undisputable and undisputed evidence that a proper simulation of the explosion -- taking proper account of the Mach stem effect -- would locate the explosion outside the luggage hold they simply decided to dismiss the existence of a scientifically well-established fact.

"We do not consider it necessary to go into any detail about Mach stem formation," the judges wrote.

Had the judges deemed it "necessary to go into the details regarding Mach stem formation," they would have been forced to acknowledge that the position of the bomb was fully incompatible with the indictment. That magic unaccompanied luggage went mysteriously through airport security was "plausible." That it jumped on its own out of the luggage hold at London airport was a little too much to believe.

In truth, a proper simulation of the explosion locates the bomb just a few inches away from the skin of the plane, a position fully consistent with the very specific damages left by the explosion.

The truth was inconvenient. The three judges had to dismiss it in order to justify a verdict that had been decided more than a decade before the first day of the Zeist trial.

Shame on those who committed this horrific act of terror. Shame on those who have ordered the cover-up. Shame on those who provided false testimony and those who suppressed and fabricated the evidence needed to frame Libya. And shame on the media, whose silence made it an accomplice.

Legal opinion openly and publicly expressed grave doubts

[On this date in 2009 an article headlined Malta and Lockerbie by Dr George Vella, now Malta’s Minister of Foreign Affairs but then in opposition, was published in The Malta Independent on Sunday. It reads as follows:]

The role that Malta played helped resolve the question of sanctions on Libya, and to seek a fair trial of the two persons suspected of the crime.

The recent release of Abdel Basset al Megrahi from a Scottish jail on humanitarian grounds, and the controversy which has erupted on the decision of the UK and the Scottish authorities to grant such an amnesty, has once again brought the issue of the disaster at Lockerbie to world attention.

I do not intend going into the merits or demerits of such a decision, but have to register my disappointment at the fact that Mr Megrahi, for reasons unknown, decided to, or was made to, abandon an appeal against the court sentence that had incriminated him as the person responsible for the Lockerbie disaster.

Over the past few years there has been mounting respected legal opinion that openly and publicly expressed grave doubts as to how correct the decision of the Scottish Court was that had found al-Megrahi guilty.

Serious doubts also emerged as to how reliable and how truthful certain witnesses were. Everything was pointing in the direction of a new trial, which most probably would have exculpated Mr al-Megrahi.

In all probability it would also have shattered, once and for all, the theory that the luggage containing the bomb that caused the disaster had been loaded at Malta airport.

I do not see how Malta can clear its name in this Lockerbie issue, now that the appeal has been abandoned.

This is very unfair, because there is mounting compelling evidence that the bomb could not have been loaded in Malta.

Besides, it is doubly unfair because we only got bad publicity.

There is little if any recognition of the fact that whatever was happening in Libya was impacting negatively on our daily lives in Malta… socially, economically and politically.

The 1992 UN-imposed air and arms embargo, and the application of selective sanctions, bore heavily on the quality of life of the Libyan population, and brought about hardship and suffering… and Malta became the main exit point for Libyans who had to travel to anywhere in Europe and beyond. The daily ferry trips from Tripoli brought to Malta an ever increasing number of Libyans, both the well intentioned who came for business, for healthcare or for onward travel, as well as less sedate and more rowdy youngsters dead bent on having a good time in Malta’s entertainment spots.

One could say that what financial loss we experienced from tourists who kept away from our shores because of Malta’s proximity to Libya, was made good by the increase in business generated by large numbers of Libyans arriving daily by sea, as well as by the increased revenue from the use they made of Air Malta flights.

For Malta, the whole Lockerbie saga also had interesting political aspects.

While sanctions lasted, both the Nationalist (1992-1996) and Labour (1996-1998) governments had to find the right balance between maintaining the best of relations with Libya, (while condemning without any reservations the terrorist act and whoever mandated it), and at the same time observing in the most scrupulous of manners the spirit and the letter of the UN-imposed sanctions.

We set up a Sanctions Monitoring Committee, and were continuously under the scrutiny of western countries to ensure that nothing that was against the sanctions, or other “dual use” materials or equipment, passed through our ports en route to Libya.

It stands to reason that the most vigilant countries were the USA and the UK.

In spite of our limited resources, we managed to retain effective control and maintained the best of relations with everyone.

When I was entrusted with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1996, four years after the imposition of sanctions, the situation in Libya was becoming alarming and worrying.

It was becoming evident that the UN sanctions were having disastrous effects on the civilian population, not least in the fields of healthcare and medical services, while leaving the regime at the top unscathed. Such “wide” sanctions were not targeting particular sectors, and they were not being monitored as to whether they were achieving the desired results.

I always tended to agree with J Kenneth Galbraith when he opined that in modern times sanctions, boycotts, and embargoes tend to have “minimal effect”. He says that sanctions “are thought to be an attractive design for bringing recalcitrant governments to heel. Instead what occurs is a reallocation of resources and a sacrifice of nonessentials”. He concludes: “With sanctions hope is great, disappointment endemic”.

I expressed these opinions and concerns on all occasions when meeting other politicians. Undoubtedly, the most fruitful meeting was the one I had with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan in Geneva in late April 1997, where, during a leisurely lunch I explained the whole situation to him, my concerns, and the way Malta was being affected. Mr Annan needed little persuasion to understand the situation, and agree that the general population in Libya was suffering unduly. He promised to follow it up with concrete measures.

As a matter of fact, he entrusted Deputy Secretary General Vladimir Petrovsky, with whom I also had had discussions, to make arrangements for a fact-finding mission to Libya, and to report back his findings for onward transmission to the Security Council.

Petrovsky and his delegation were in Libya between 13 and 18 December, and by the beginning of February presented a report that confirmed, without any shadow of doubt, the disastrous effects sanctions were having on the general population.

The report was factual, but the unwritten message was that when United Nations member states introduce sanctions they also have to shoulder the responsibility of ensuring that such sanctions do not prejudice the economic and social well-being of the general population.

A week after publishing his report, Mr Petrovsky, in recognition of the role we played in highlighting the humanitarian situation in Libya, came to see me in Malta and we gave a press conference together at which he spoke about his mission, his findings, and his recommendations.

Following Petrovsky’s report, the UN General Assembly, on 20 March, embarked on an open debate on the effectiveness of sanctions. Malta participated in this debate and we took the opportunity to explain clearly our views on the subject.

During all this time the USA and the UK kept insisting that Libya hand over to them for trial, in either the USA or Scotland, two men – Abdel Basset al-Megrahi and Lamin Kalifah Phimah, described as Libyan intelligence agents – who were to be charged with the planting of the suitcase bomb that caused the Lockerbie disaster.

Libya always insisted that these suspected Libyan citizens would never get a fair trial in either of these countries.

The standoff continued as both sides would not budge from their entrenched positions.

Libya repeatedly stated that it would accept a trial before a Scottish court sitting in a third country. Libyan Foreign Minister Omar Montasser, in a letter to the President of the Security Council in January 1998, wrote that Libya “accepted the proposal of the League of Arab States that the two suspects should be tried by a court in a neutral country and that they should be tried at The Hague by Scottish judges and in accordance with Scottish law”.

When I visited the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in his traditional tent in a military complex in Sirte on 7 March 1998 at the end of a long meeting, during which no reference was made to the Lockerbie stalemate, he asked me whether I could do him the favour of relaying a message to the UK Foreign Minister, Robin Cook, who he knew I was to meet in London in a few days’ time.

He asked me to convey to the British Foreign Secretary his solemn commitment that if the Libyan proposal to have a trial in a neutral third country under Scottish law was accepted by the UK and USA, he would be willing to hand over the suspects,

On 26 March, I was at the UK Foreign Office in London meeting Robin Cook.

My acquaintance and friendship with Robin, through party relations, went back to well before he became Foreign Minister. Even so I must say I was at a loss as to how to broach the subject of Lockerbie in our discussion, as after years of stalemate and Libyan intransigence, it had become a sore topic to discuss. Luckily it was Robin himself who provided the opportunity by asking me how my meeting with Muammar Gaddafi had gone.

When I passed on Gaddafi’s message and promise, Robin Cook seemed pleasantly surprised, acknowledged the commitment expressed and promised to work on it, as he wished to get this issue out of the way as soon as possible. He asked me whether he could count on us as a go-between if need be, and wanted to know where the suspects would spend their prison term if found guilty.

I told him I had to refer back for an answer, but informed him that the Libyan Foreign Minister Montasser had qualified Gaddafi’s commitment by saying that they would only accept a trial under Scottish law, as this did not include the death penalty; that during the trial no extra charges against the suspects would be contemplated; and that if found guilty the suspects would not be sent to a US jail.

We informed the State Department of these recent developments through our Embassy in Washington, and got the impression that whereas they were happy with developments, they would rather let the UK take the initiatives. This attitude is also expressed in Madeline Albright’s autobiography, when explaining the pressure she was under from the families of the Lockerbie victims to take effective action.

I know for a fact that the British started exploring the possibility of changing their stance and, apart from doing further research on the Libyan proposal through their contacts, also started exploring the possibility of enacting legislation so that a Scottish Court could hold a trial under Scottish law in The Hague.

With Robin Cook’s knowledge, I had separate meetings in April with Belgian Foreign Minister Derycke in Brussels, as well as with the German Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel in Bonn, who were both enthusiastic about the prospects of a breakthrough.

In the same month I had two other meetings with Robin Cook, one in Palma de Majorca and the other in Brussels, during which he briefed me on developments, and I renewed our commitment to be of help if needed.

On 19 May I had a scheduled meeting with Libyan Foreign Minister Montasser in Cartghena, Columbia where we were both attending a meeting of the non-aligned countries. Mr Montasser brought me “au courant” on what was happening through discreet diplomatic contacts, and reiterated Libya’s commitment to keep its promise if the UK and the US accepted the notion of a trial held in a neutral third country under Scottish law.

On 21 July the information reaching the Maltese Ministry of Foreign Affairs from the Middle Eastern Affairs Section of the State Department was that a deal had not yet been done, but it looked as if it was going to go through, as the US had agreed, together with the UK, to try the Lockerbie suspects under Scottish law in The Netherlands with a senior Scottish judge and a panel of international judges but no jury.

Concerns were expressed as to whether Gaddafi would keep his promise and let the suspects go to trial. Malta’s help was again solicited, if the need arose.

These views and doubts as to whether Gaddafi would keep his word were expressed in the press. The Guardian wrote about “New Move to Force Trial of Lockerbie Bomb Suspects”, and another piece entitled “Lockerbie: the West takes a gamble”, reflected the lack of faith the West had in Libya’s credibility.

That same evening, following the speculation in the press, Ceefax reported that Rosemary Wolf, the representative of the American relatives of the Lockerbie victims, said she had been told by Madeline Albright that a trial under Scottish law, but not on Scottish soil was being explored, which sparked off a lively debate on the whole issue during adjournment time in the House of Commons.

This was the 15th adjournment debate on Lockerbie, but contrary to the others this debate was one that saw hope in finding a way out of the impasse. As one member put it, “This adjournment debate is really a plea of encouragement for such a course of action.”

The next day the world press headlines were all about the possible “softening” of the US and UK stance on Lockerbie; the possibility of the Pan Am 103 Trial moving to The Hague; Madeline Albright being reported lobbying American relatives of the Lockerbie victims to accept a trial of the Libyan suspects under Scottish law in The Hague and other headlines expressing general agreement and praising the breakthrough.

In the meantime, I was asked to ascertain once again the Libyan position, in view of the imminent decision that was to be taken by the UK and the US.

On the morning of 22 July I once again contacted Libyan Foreign Minister Omar Montasser by phone.

Mr Montasser asked me to pass on the following information – that the Libyan government was standing firm in its intention to accept a trial of the suspects in a third country, a neutral country. He mentioned The Hague, but he even mentioned Malta. He told me that Libya was ready to discuss details if there was a UN Security Council Resolution providing for this option and that Libya would accept a trial under Scottish law, with a whole bench of Scottish judges, or with a Scottish Chief Justice and a bench made up of other international judges. As to where the alleged suspects were to spend their time in jail if found guilty, Montasser told me that Libya was ready to discuss this and come to an agreement before the trial. Asked whether Libya would accept extradition of condemned suspects to another country in which to spend their sentences if found guilty, Montasser replied that this would be discussed and decided on at Security Council level.

I informed Montasser that I was going to convey his message to Robin Cook, and that I would keep in contact, were I to have any replies or further questions.

That same day this message was relayed to both the British Foreign Office as well as to the US State Department. To this message we added that, for our part, we felt that this commitment from Libya was useful in helping them form an opinion and come to a decision, and secondly we conveyed our feeling that with this option, the Libyans, according to our reading, “will play ball”.

That same day a message was sent by the US State Department to all the US Embassies around the world, explaining the US position on the matter, in view of the fact that “Although no decision has yet been made to pursue the case in another venue, that option is now being actively considered.”

On 24 August, a month later, the UK and the US sent a joint letter to the UN Secretary General, informing him of the agreed arrangements, outlining the parameters within which the trial was to be held, and detailing what they expected of the Libyan authorities by way of cooperation. They informed Kofi Annan that the initiative they were presenting was a sincere attempt “… to resolve this issue, and is an approach which has recently been endorsed by others, including the Organisation of African Unity, the League of Arab States, the Non Aligned Movement, and the Islamic Conference.”

The letter from the UK and the US ended by expressing trust “that Libya will respond promptly, positively and unequivocally by ensuring the timely appearance of the two accused in the Netherlands for trial before the Scottish Court…”

Two days later, the General People’s Committee for Foreign Liaison and International Cooperation in Libya expressed general agreement with the terms outlined in the letter from the US and the UK to the UN Secretary General.

A draft UN Resolution, covering the agreement and the modalities within which the trial was to be held, was adopted unanimously by the Security Council on 27August 1998.

Our only remaining task then was to exhort the Libyan authorities to keep their promise and abide by the resolution. This the Libyan authorities did without fail.

As the saying goes, “The rest is history”!

As a footnote to this rather lengthy explanation as to why Malta should not be made to carry the burden of a negative image because of any involvement in the Lockerbie tragedy, it has to be said that, on the contrary, Malta has to be commended for undertaking such an onerous diplomatic task and for contributing in its small way to the solution of a political issue that could have had far worse consequences, had it been left to continue indefinitely for years.

Probe into Lockerbie timer claims

[This is the headline over a report that was published in The Herald on this date in 2007. It reads as follows:]

The makers of the timer used to explode the Lockerbie bomb will travel to Scotland following the revelation that their former employee planted vital evidence.

Edwin Bollier, whose now bankrupt company Mebo manufactured the timer switch that prosecutors used to implicate Libya, plans to visit Scotland with police forensics experts, following news that an engineer was asked to fabricate evidence.

Ulrich Lumpert, formerly an electronics engineer with Mebo AG, Zurich, has signed an affidavit admitting he committed perjury before the Scottish Court in the Netherlands.

In his affidavit he states that he stole a handmade sample of an "MST-13 Timer PC-board" from Mebo in Zurich and handed it over, on June 22 1989, to an "official person investigating the Lockerbie case."

He further states that the fragment of the timer, cut into two pieces for "supposedly forensic reasons," which was presented in court stemmed from the same piece.

He further states that when he became aware that this piece was used for an "intentional politically motivated criminal undertaking" he decided, out of fear for his life, to keep silent on the matter.

Mr Bollier has already spoken to prosecutors in Switzerland who will begin their investigation into charges of perjury next week.

The timer was used as a key part of the evidence against Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, the Libyan convicted of the 1988 bombing which killed 270 people. The revelation will strengthen Megrahi's fresh appeal which was granted in June by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission.

Despite Megrahi's conviction, there have been persistent claims that Libya was not responsible, some evidence was rigged, and the finger of suspicion pointed elsewhere.

The commission rejected allegations that evidence had been falsified or "spirited away" by the investigating teams, but the affidavit by Mr Lumpert suggests otherwise.

Mr Bollier told The Herald last night: "We hope to go to Scotland with the police and forensics people from Switzerland to see the manipulated fragment. We have forwarded on the papers and affidavit to prosecutors here and they will also be passed to the lord Advocate in Scotland."

In 2001, Mr Bollier spent five days in the witness box at the Lockerbie trial at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands.

He told The Herald that the fragments he was shown at the trial were different to those originally shown to him. "The fragments kept changing," he said. "The procurator-fiscal showed me one fragment then the police showed me a fragment in two parts - one was green, one was brown.

"Later in the witness box I was shown a screen and the smaller piece was completely carbonised - you could not even see the colour. It had been manipulated, but when I tried to say that the judge cut me off."

Dr Hans Koechler, international UN observer at the Scottish Court in the Netherlands, has seen a copy of the affidavit made on July 18. He said: "The Scottish authorities are now obliged to investigate this situation. Not only has Mr Lumpert admitted to stealing a sample of the timer, but to the fact he gave it to an official and then lied in court."

Failure of the justice system

[On this date in 2011 an article in Dutch about the Lockerbie case by Daan de Wit was published on the DeepJournal website. What follows is a translation into English:]

The verdict in the Lockerbie case is based on lies and deception, and the man convicted of the crime, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, cannot be the perpetrator. This appears from revelations contained in a secret section of an official report.

'Lockerbie' was investigated down to the last detail by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, SCCRC. After four years, the Commission produced the findings of an investigation which cost millions to carry out and that is partly still secret, but which was seen by journalist Marcello Mega: 'The report shows Scots detectives on the original investigation, together with Crown prosecutors and their US colleagues, deliberately covered up evidence and witness statements that did not fit the case.' This quote is taken from an article by Mega published in The Scottish Sun. His article can no longer be found on The Scottish Sun website. It was erroneously edited by one of the newspaper's editors, after which - even though it was related to a technicality - the article was removed from the website in its entirety. Upon request, Mega emailed the quote and the remainder of the article to DeepJournal.

'Megrahi is not the Lockerbie bomber'

Before Mega's article was removed, it had already been quoted online: '[...] Robert Black QC, retired Professor of Scots Law at Edinburgh University and the architect of the Lockerbie trial, told how he believes Megrahi is innocent. Mr Black said: "Megrahi is not the Lockerbie bomber and these revelations further underline that. […] "That the judges did convict him on the flimsiest of evidence, which required several leaps of faith on a number of crucial matters that had not been proven by the Crown, remains a matter of profound concern for all of us." Mr Black said it was now vital that a top-level public inquiry is held to get to the truth.'

Back in July, Mega wrote: 'You’ll just have to take my word for it that this case represents the worst injustice perpetrated by the courts that I’ve encoutered in 22 years as a journalist.’

In a letter dating roughly to 2008 that was recently discovered in the headquarters of the Libyan intelligence services and directed at a Gaddafi advisor, al-Megrahi writes that he is innocent.

'Failure of the justice system'

Robert Black quotes from Mega's article: ‘[The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission] has grave concerns over the evidence against the 59-year-old [Megrahi] following a multi-million-pound, four-year investigation. In the dossier - seen by The Scottish Sun - Maltese shopkeeper Tony Gauci, who helped finger Megrahi as the bomber, is described as an "unreliable" witness. […] One undisclosed memo reveals the FBI discussed with Scots cops an offer of unlimited cash to Gauci - with "$10,000 available immediately".' Mega from his email: 'He and his brother Paul were rewarded for their testimony, receiving more than $2m and $1m respectively.'

An 800-page summary of the report was published in 2007. A quote from the summary: ‘The applicant [Megrahi] may have suffered a miscarriage of justice’. A 2007 headline from The Scotsman reads: 'Lockerbie evidence 'was tampered with, destroyed and overlooked'.

'Police are also accused of lying in court while prosecutors - including then Lord Advocate Colin Boyd QC - are suspected of suppressing bombshell evidence that would likely have seen Megrahi walk free.'

Petition for a new investigation

On Black's website is a petition from Justice for Megrahi, an organization that Black is affiliated with: ‘We would argue that for nearly 23 years Scottish Courts and the Scottish Government have failed to deliver the truth about Lockerbie despite these claims of supremacy in human rights matters. We are at a loss to equate the current government’s refusal to hold a judicial inquiry into Lockerbie with this principle that Scotland and Scotland alone is capable of delivering justice to all of its people.’

Mega writes: 'Dr Jim Swire, who lost his daughter Flora on the doomed flight, said: ‘This underlines again the need for a full public inquiry. It’s too easy for everyone to maintain Megrahi was convicted so he must be guilty, when clearly he is not.' Megrahi was recently tracked down in Tripoli.

Palestinian terrorists acting on orders from Iran

This four part series of articles on Lockerbie offers more background information on the case. It starts with the search for the real perpetrator. For the time being all signs point in the direction of Iran and the Palestinian terrorist organization PFLP-GC. In 1988 the US Navy's USS Vincennes shot down an Iranian airliner, killing all 290 civilian passengers on board. In retaliation, the PFLP-GC, under the command of Ahmed Jibril and acting on orders from Iran, is suspected of bringing down Pan Am flight 103 that same year.