Attack of Lockerbie
The attack of Lockerbie took place the December 21st 1988 against a Boeing 747 of the American company Pan Am, which ensured the connection London - New York. It exploded with the top of the Scottish village of Lockerbie (the United Kingdom) and caused the death of 270 people (259 passengers and team members, like eleven villagers).
Silent partners
The suspicions of the international community initially went on the Syria, the Iran, as well as dissenting groups Palestinian. However, gradually, the Libya of Mouammar Kadhafi finds marked Attentat and is seen summoned to deliver two of its nationals, against whom a Mandat of international stop is delivered in 1991: they are shown to have sent a case containing a bomb of Malta to Frankfurt, then in London (Heathrow) where the case would then have been placed on the flight Pan Am 103.However, there still exists of serious doubts about the real implication of Libya in this attack and these charges did not put an end to the rumors of Syrian, Iranian, Palestinian implication and even that of South Africa. More especially as on the 2 shown, 1 was discharged and the validity of the 2 witnesses having put in charge the second Libyan is called into question (the first witness retracted, second is shown to have touched an envelope on behalf of the investigators).
The international community condemns Libya
In spite of these doubts, the the United States and the the United Kingdom obtained win with the Safety advice of the United Nations which, the January 21st 1992, requires that Libya extradite the two suspects towards the United States or the United Kingdom. The Safety advice also requires that Libya cooperates with the France in the investigation into another attack, against a plane of French company ATU with the top of the Niger, which had caused death of 171 passengers and for which a suspect French judge four Libyans to have posed a bomb on board apparatus.Following the Libyan refusal to extradite his nationals, the Safety advice adopted the Résolution 748 (1992) the March 31st 1992 envisaging the suspension of the air traffic towards and starting from Libya as well as the prohibition of any sale of Arme S with this country. Additional sanctions are added in the Résolution 883 (1993) which is adopted the November 11th 1993: the Libyan assets abroad should be cold (except for the oil incomes ) and export to this material country intended for gas oil industry and would be prohibited. Moreover, the offices abroad of the Libyan airline company should also be closed and helps it with the Libyan civil aviation (sale of spare parts, training of pilots, etc) stopped.
Thus, the Safety advice of UNO aligns itself on the mode of sanctions already envisaged by the United States. Who thereafter are further, adopting a law of sanction in the opposition to Iran and Libya, which envisages measurements against any authority which cooperates with these two countries (whereas the overseas investments in the oil industry and gas of Iran and Libya amount to 40 million dollars per annum).
Libya cooperates with the international community
In 1998, supported by Nelson Mandela - the former president of South Africa - Libya and the international community find an agreement concerning the judgment of the two marked Libyans. The lawsuit takes place finally with the Netherlands in Camp Zeist an old military base américano-Dutchwoman, under the direction of judges Scot and according to the legislation of this country.In 1999, as of the delivery of the two Libyan suspects, the sanctions imposed by the Safety advice of the United Nations are suspended.
The January 31st 2001, a jury of three judges Scot declares guilty one of the accused, Mr. Abdel Basset Ali Megrahi, and condemned it to the life imprisonment. The other accused, Mr. Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, was discharged and returns the day following to Libya.
In August 2003, Libya recognizes officially its responsibility in the attack for Lockerbie and then paid 10 million dollars of compensation to each of the 270 families of the victims is a total of 2,7 billion dollars. As of September, the sanctions of UNO in its connection are definitively raised.
Doubts
In August 2005, a former high ranking official of the Scottish police force wishing to remain anonymous, having taken part in the investigation, affirms that the CIA would have “ written the scenario ” showing the Libya. He affirms that the decisive Incriminating evidence, a fragment of integrated circuit of the Détonateur, was “ manufactured ” and “ deposited ” by agents of the CIA which inquired into the tragedy.A new dramatic turn of events comes to consolidate this assumption later two years (July 2007), when the Swiss engineer in electronics, Ulrich Lumpert, admits having provided to the Scottish police force the fragment of “retarder”, presented as found on the spot of the crash landing by Scottish justice. Lumpert, which worked for the company manufacturing this component, had also appraised this incriminating evidence at the time of the lawsuit. It waited until the term of limitation passed to minimize the risks incurred for false witness.
In October 2007, one learns that the tradesman Maltais Tony Gauci, principal witness for the prosecution, would have seen himself offering an envelope of 2 million dollars, at the request of the inspectors in charge of the investigation, in exchange of the false witness having allowed the life sentence of Abdel Basset Al-Megrahi. A revision of the judgment was granted to Abdel Basset Al-Megrahi by the Scottish commission of the revisions. Then, the former British diplomat Patrick Haseldine lance a call near the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, for an Investigation UNO into the death of Bernt Carlsson in the Attack of Lockerbie.