Enver Masud, "Pan Am 103:
Lockerbie Verdict 'Astonishing'," The Wisdom Fund, February 6, 2001
John Ashton and Ian Ferguson, "Cover-Up of Convenience: The Hidden Scandal of
Lockerbie," Mainstream Publishing Company (November 2001)
[The brother of a victim of the Lockerbie disaster has vowed to
reject a multi-million pound compensation deal from Libya because he
does not believe it has been proved guilty of the attack.--Stephen
Khan, "Lockerbie brother: 'I don't want £6m, I want the
truth'," The Observer (UK), August 17, 2003]
[WHY did the court accept identification evidence from Maltese
shopkeeper Tony Gauci when it knew that Gauci would receive $4m
reward from the USA if Al-Megrahi was convicted? --"Lockerbie . . . In search of
the truth," August 23, 2003
Adam Sage, "Gaddafi
hails new era after 'deal' over French air disaster," Times Online,
September 1, 2001
[The United Nations security council yesterday ended 11 years of
sanctions against Libya, clearing the way for 270 families of the
Lockerbie bomb victims to each be paid $4m, or £2.5m, compensation.
. . .
If the US were to lift its sanctions, unlikely in the current
climate, the families will each receive another $4m. If Libya is
removed from the state department's list of terror sponsors, they
will get an additional $2m - a total of $10m for each family. If the
US does not lift its sanctions within eight months, the families
will receive only $1m more, or $5m per victim. . . .
Yesterday's vote had been postponed for more than three weeks while
French families whose relatives were on a UTA flight bombed over the
Niger desert in 1989, killing 170, renegotiated a settlement made
with Libya in 1999. France settled on $33m for all the families.
But, embarrassed when they saw what Lockerbie families were getting,
the French demanded more. UTA relatives announced on Thursday an
agreement that would lead to a settlement.--Gary Younge and Brian
Whitaker, "Lockerbie relatives see UN end Libya sanctions," Guardian,
September 13, 2003]
"Lockerbie
families demand inquiry," BBC News, December 21, 2003
"Libya signs UTA
bombing payout," BBC News, January 9, 2004
"Libyan
PM denies country's guilt," BBC News, February 24, 2004
"'Doubts' over
Lockerbie evidence," BBC News, August 19, 2005
Marcello Mega, "Police chief:
Lockerbie evidence was faked," Scotsman.com, August 28, 2005
[Michael Scharf, who was the counsel to the US counter-terrorism bureau when
the two Libyans were indicted for the bombing, described the case as "so
full of holes it was like Swiss cheese" and said it should never have gone
to trial. . .
Robert Black, professor of Scots law at Edinburgh University and the
principal architect of the Lockerbie trial at Camp Zeist, described the
Lockerbie case as "a fraud". . . .
Dr Jim Swire, who lost his daughter Flora in the bombing, said: "Myself and
Michael Scharf are coming from exactly the same position. I went to the
trial and became convinced after watching it unfold that the case was full
of holes."--Liam McDougall, "Lockerbie trial was a CIA fix, US
intelligence insider claims," Sunday Herald, November 12, 2006]
[Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi was jailed for the 1988 atrocity in which
270 people died when Pan-Am flight 103 exploded over the Scottish town.
The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, which has been investigating
Megrahi's case since 2003, recommended the second appeal.--"Lockerbie bomber allowed appeal," BBC News, June 28, 2007]
[Libya could demand the return of the $2.7bn in compensation it paid to the
victims' families - without ever accepting guilt.--Roger Hardy, "Lockerbie: The
awkward questions," BBC News, June 28, 2007]
Alex Duval Smith, "Vital
Lockerbie evidence 'was tampered with," Observer, September 2, 2007
Lucy Adams, "Revealed:
CIA offered $2m to Lockerbie witness and brother," Herald, October 3, 2007
[The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission identified six aspects of the
case against Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi where it believes that "a
miscarriage of justice may have occurred".--Michael Howie, "Lockerbie
evidence withheld from defence," Scotsman, October 4, 2007]
[A Libyan "double agent" who was central to the CIA's investigation into the
Lockerbie bombing exaggerated his importance in Tripoli's intelligence
apparatus and gave little information of value, yet is still living at the
US taxpayers' expense in a witness protection programme, according to
previously unseen CIA cables.
. . . Majid Giaka arrived at the Lockerbie bombing trial in the
Netherlands. He described how he had seen Megrahi and his co-accused,
Khalifa Fhimah, at Luqa airport before the bombing with a large brown
suitcase. But the CIA cables confirm that nearly two years before, Mr Giaka
didn't remember anything.
At the Lockerbie trial, the four judges described some of his evidence as
"at best grossly exaggerated and at worst simply untrue" and concluded he
was "largely motivated by financial considerations".--Guy Smith, "CIA memos reveal doubts
over 'key' Lockerbie witness," Independent, August 31, 2008]
[A Scottish court ruled Wednesday that Abdel Basset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi
can make a wide-ranging appeal against his conviction.--"Convicted Lockerbie bomber wins legal victory," Associated
Press, October 15, 2008]
Glenn Kessler, "Libya's Final Payment to Victims' Fund Clears Way
for Normal U.S. Ties," Washington Post, November 1, 2008
[Swire added on Sky News television: "There are very worrying rumours
circulating in Scotland that he may have been persuaded to accept the
concept of compassionate release in return for withdrawing his appeal.
--Katherine Haddon, "Lockerbie bomber to be freed: British media," AFP,
August 12, 2009]
AUDIO: Severin Carrell, "There's a split between victims' relatives in the UK and
US'," Guardian, August 19, 2009
[ . . . many British families supported his release on compassionate
grounds, with many unconvinced that he was fully, or even partially,
responsible for the atrocity.--Haroon Siddique, Dan Milmo and Severin
Carrell, "Lockerbie bomber freed from prison," Guardian, August 20, 2009]
Jerry Adler, "The End of
Lockerbie," Newsweek, August 20, 2009
[On the flight from Scotland, Mr. Megrahi was accompanied by Saif al-Islam,
the son of the Libyan leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, stamping an official
imprimatur on his release and reinforcing the official Libyan view that Mr.
Megrahi was a scapegoat used by the West to reinforce its depiction of Libya
as a pariah state.
The welcome was another slight for Washington, which had sought strenuously
to persuade Libya not to permit a hero's welcome for Mr. Megrahi and had
opposed his release.--Alan Cowell and A. G. Sulzberger, "Lockerbie Convict Arrives Home in Libya," New York Times, August
20, 2009]
Reevel Alderson, "Megrahi:
'A convenient scapegoat?'," BBC News, August 20, 2009
Peter Beaumont, Ewen MacAskill and Nicholas Watt, "Lockerbie fury grows as Gaddafi meets bomber
Megrahi," Guardian, August 22, 2009
[1986: Libya is accused of bombing a Berlin disco, killing two U.S.
servicemen. A defector from Israel's intelligence agency, Mossad, claims it
framed Libya. Khadaffy demands Arabs increase oil prices.
1987: The U.S. tries to kill Khadaffy but fails. Eighty-eight Libyan
civilians die.
1988: France wages a secret desert war with Libya over mineral-rich Chad.
France's secret service, SDECE, is ordered to kill Khadaffy. A bomb is put
on Khadaffy's private jet but, after Franco-Libyan relations abruptly
improve, the bomb is removed before it explodes.
1988: The U.S. intervenes on Iraq's side in its eight-year war against Iran.
A U.S. navy Aegis cruiser, Vincennes, violates Iranian waters and
"mistakenly" shoots down an Iranian civilian Airbus airliner in Iran's air
space. All 288 civilians aboard die. Then vice-president George H.W. Bush
vows, "I'll never apologize ... I don't care what the facts are."
The Vincennes' trigger-happy captain is decorated with the Legion of Merit
medal for this crime by Bush after he becomes president. Washington quietly
pays Iran $131.8 million US in damages.Eric Margolis, "Lockerbie Part of a
Bigger Story," commondreams.org, August 30, 2009]
[No one in authority has had the guts to state the truth about the bombing
of Pan Am Flight 103 above the Scottish village of Lockerbie on 21 December
1988, in which 270 people were killed. The governments in England and
Scotland in effect blackmailed Megrahi into dropping his appeal as a
condition of his immediate release. Of course there were oil and arms deals
under way with Libya; but had Megrahi proceeded with his appeal, some 600
pages of new and deliberately suppressed evidence would have set the seal on
his innocence and given us more than a glimpse of how and why he was
stitched up for the benefit of "strategic interests".
"The endgame came down to damage limitation," said the former CIA officer
Robert Baer, who took part in the original investigation, "because the
evidence amassed by [Megrahi's] appeal is explosive and extremely damning to
the system of justice." New witnesses would show that it was impossible for
Megrahi to have bought clothes that were found in the wreckage of the Pan Am
aircraft - he was convicted on the word of a Maltese shopowner who claimed
to have sold him the clothes, then gave a false description of him in 19
separate statements and even failed to recognise him in the courtroom.
The new evidence would have shown that a fragment of a circuit board and
bomb timer, "discovered" in the Scottish countryside and said to have been
in Megrahi's suitcase, was probably a plant. A forensic scientist found no
trace of an explosion on it. The new evidence would demonstrate the
impossibility of the bomb beginning its journey in Malta before it was
"transferred" through two airports undetected to Flight 103.
A "key secret witness" at the original trial, who claimed to have seen
Megrahi and his co-accused, al-Alim Khalifa Fahimah (who was acquitted),
loading the bomb on to the plane at Frankfurt, was bribed by the US
authorities holding him as a "protected witness". The defence exposed him as
a CIA informer who stood to collect, on the Libyans' conviction, up to $4m
as a reward.--John Pilger, "Megrahi Was Framed," New Statesman, September 3,
2009
Severin Carrell, "US paid reward to Lockerbie witness, Abdelbaset
al-Megrahi papers claim ," Guardian, October 2, 2009
. . . What many of the relatives, including Jim Swire, whose
daughter Flora was killed, continue to point out is the huge number
of number of unanswered questions surrounding the bombing.
Why did the CIA need to pay its star witness, Abdul Majid Giaka,
$2.7m (£1.7m) to give evidence? Why was that evidence only
forthcoming after he had received the money?