Has Libya been framed with the Pan Am flight 103 bombing?

Will Libya Compensate the Families of Lockerbie Victims?

By Andrew I. Killgore

On March 11 Reuters reported that Libya was ready to accept “civil responsibility” for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, in which 259 passengers, most of them Americans, and 11 persons on the ground were killed. According to the report, carried in the Israeli daily Ha’aretz, Libya was willing to compensate the victims’ relatives with an initial payment of $4 billion into an escrow account following the formal lifting of United Nations sanctions, which were suspended after the Lockerbie trial.

In discussions in London among representatives of the U.S., Britain and Libya, Tripoli reportedly agreed that another $4 billion would be paid if the United States removes its national sanctions against Libya, and a final $2 billion will be paid if the U.S. repeals ILSA (the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act). Should Washington fail to lift its sanctions and to repeal ILSA within eight months, Libya would pay only $1 billion more into the escrow account, limiting its payment to $5 billion, or $5 million per victim.

Libyan leader Muammar al-Qaddafi was quoted in a January Newsweek magazine article as saying that he had no problem with paying compensation for Lockerbie, but that Washington should in turn compensate Libya for the 1986 U.S. bombing raid on Tripoli. (That raid, launched from airfields in England and from U.S. aircraft carriers in the Mediterranean, killed around 30 people in Tripoli and Sirte, including Colonel Qaddafi’s young adopted daughter.)

While giving no further details on the London talks, the Department of State said only, “It was a useful session and we made further progress,” according to Ha’aretz. Lockerbie victims’ families met at the State Department on March 12 for an update on the issue. A senior official at the London talks said the United States will repeal neither its sanctions nor ILSA.

Lingering Doubts

Against the background of apparent progress toward a settlement of the Lockerbie tragedy, a process is under way that may cause Colonel Qaddafi to change his mind, or at least lower the amounts he is willing to pay in compensation. The conviction of Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi for planting the bomb that destroyed Pan Am 103 on Dec. 21, 1988 has left many doubting his guilt.

An appeal to the Scottish Criminal Law Review Commission is now being prepared on the grounds that al-Megrahi’s defense was inadequate. The appeal may be ready by the end of May, according to Dr. Robert Black, professor of criminal law at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland and mastermind of the unique legal arrangements for trying Libyan defendants under Scottish law in the Netherlands. (The trial was held at Camp Zeist, a former American military base near Amsterdam.)

The question of finding who really is guilty of killing the victims won’t go away. The United States apparently considers the case closed, and will not discuss looking behind the original verdict which, after all, found al-Megrahi guilty.

If, however, the Scottish Criminal Law Review Commission finds that al-Megrahi’s lawyers did not afford him an adequate defense, what is to be done? Dr. Black believes that pressure from the families—he mentioned 10 powerful families of surviving British relatives—could force the British government to establish a Tribunal of Inquiry. The purpose of the tribunal would be to determine once and for all who destroyed Pan Am 103 and what the motive was.

In a March 7 conversation with the Washington Report Jim Swire, whose daughter was killed at Lockerbie, expressed serious doubt about the Libya-did-it theory. As an officer in the British Army, Swire specialized in explosives, later studying medicine to become a doctor. He said he does not believe the bomb destroying Pan Am 103 was put aboard in Valetta, Malta, as the prosecution in the Lockerbie trial successfully maintained.

Swire spoke with bitterness of the Lockerbie trial, which he believes was manipulated by the CIA. He mentioned a telephone call from British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw on the day the appeal court upheld al-Megrahi’s guilt as saying that “no useful purpose” would be served by further inquiry.

Should Muammar Qaddafi insist that the U.S. compensate him for bombing Tripoli in 1986 and Washington refuse, we are as far away from a settlement as before.

Andrew I. Killgore is publisher of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.