Innocence of Megrahi and Libya does not point to guilt of Iran

[What follows is excerpted from an article by Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer published today on his Intel Today website, where full supporting citations can be found:]

On January 6 2020, President Hassan Rouhani tweeted the following message:

“Those who refer to the number 52 should also remember the number 290. #IR655. Never threaten the Iranian nation.”

This tweet was a response to President Donald Trump’s threat to target 52 sites in Iran should it retaliate against the US drone strike that killed top Iranian military figure General Qassem Soleimani on January 3 2020.

Not surprisingly, Rouhani’s message was quickly commented on by Middle East and Lockerbie experts as well as by imbeciles and hypocrites.

Real experts —

Middle East analyst Fatima Alasrar, from the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, was one of the first to indicate the link between Rouhani’s tweet and Lockerbie.

“Rouhani is basically reminding @realDonaldTrump of the #Iranian Air Flight 655 carrying 290 passengers which was downed by a US navy warship the Vincennes in 1988.

Though it was deemed a human error, Tehran worked covertly to exact its revenge.

How? Lockerbie.”

Robert Black — Professor Emeritus of Scots Law in the University of Edinburgh and best known as the architect of the Lockerbie Trial– concurs.

Speaking to The National as Iran continued to mourn Soleimani, Black said:

“I think Rouhani’s tweet does refer to Pan Am 103 … The 290 clearly refers to those killed on Iran Air 655 and with ‘Never threaten the Iranian nation’ it seems to me that he’s saying that Iran responded to those Iranian deaths caused by US action.

The only response that I can think of was the bombing of Pan Am 103 six months later.”

Imbeciles and hypocrites —

Given half a chance, idiots will never miss the opportunity to share with you their “deep knowledge” on sensitive issues. The current Iran Crisis is a case in point.

Describing himself as an expert on terrorism strategy with 36 years of services in the US Intel Community, Malcolm Nance tweeted:

“PANAM 103 was DEFINATELY Qaddafi Libya. We found the same Swiss digital detonators were purchased by Libyan intelligence and were also used on the UTA 772 in flight bombing. No question. Iran had nothing to do with it.”

Here is a quick primer for this “expert”. Firstly, no detonators were recovered, let alone identified, among the debris of PA 103 and UTA 772.

Secondly, the timer that allegedly triggered the bomb on UTA 772 was produced in Taiwan, not Switzerland.

Thirdly, we know now that PT/35(b) — a fragment of an PCB allegedly found at Lockerbie — does NOT match the metallurgy of the Swiss timers — MST13 — delivered to Libya. Full stop. (...)

Intel Today analysis —

There is no doubt whatsoever that Rouhani makes a direct reference to the 290 victims of Iranian Air Flight 655.

His warning “Never threaten the Iranian nation” appears to be a veiled threat suggesting that Iran will retaliate for Soleimani’s assassination just like they did in the case of Iranian Air Flight 655.

Assuming that this is indeed what Rouhani means, then it seems logical to conclude that he is claiming Iran’s responsibility for the downing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie.

Actually, it is not the first time that a high level Iranian cleric claims responsibility for Lockerbie.

Indeed, when I spoke to Bani Sadr — who served as the first president of the Republic of Iran — he told me that ayatollah Motashemi-pur had immediately taken credit for the Lockerbie bombing which he regarded as a “just revenge” for Flight 655.

However…

Let me say this one more time. There is no doubt whatsoever that the Lockerbie verdict is utter nonsense.

Megrahi — the man known as the Lockerbie bomber — clearly suffered a spectacular miscarriage of justice.

In fact, the analysis of the fragment that linked Libya to Lockerbie demonstrates that the Swiss timers delivered to Libya played no role in the tragedy.

This is, in my opinion, the only reasonable conclusion that an honest person can reach.

However, to many observers, the innocence of Megrahi — and Libya — can only point to the guilt of Iran.

I can not agree with such a flawed logic, for it may very well replace a 30 years old lie by a new one, which would be quite convenient to certain groups today as it would suit very well their geopolitical agenda. (...)

Let me make this point very clear. There is not a shred of evidence that Iran ordered the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie as an act of retaliation for Iran Air 655.

And there is a good reason for that which I will reveal today.

In the aftermath of Flight 655 disaster, the US and Iran conducted a series of secret talks in the city of Montreux, Switzerland.  Richard Lawless was representing Bush and Abolghasem Mesbahi was an envoy of Rafsanjani.

By the end of September 1988 — 3 months before Lockerbie — they managed to settle an agreement.

None of this has ever been made public for obvious reasons. It would have been perceived as a second IranGate scandal. (...)

So, what really happened?

The Lockerbie investigation underwent three separated stages. In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the American and British investigators quickly identified the cause of the tragedy as well as those responsible for it.

However, both Bush and Thatcher agreed that the truth was inconvenient.

From early January 1989 to March 1989, US and UK Intelligence agencies were busy writing a script implicating Iran.

That was not a very difficult task considering that very realistic but false “means, motive, and opportunity” could easily be wowen into a rather believable story.

Basically, the events of the “Autumn Leaves” operation — the PFLP-GC cell operating in Frankfurt — became a blueprint for the script. Thus all the key items appear at this stage: brown Samsonite, clothes from Malta, Toshiba radio, Semtex, Frankfurt, etc…

But in March 1989,  George H W Bush and Margaret Thatcher decided to hold off this game plan.

Why? Remember that the US is in secret talks with Rafsanjani and the future seems promising.

Ayatollah Khomeini is dying and his hardliner heir — Grand Ayatollah Montazeri — has been sacked on March 26 1989.

Khomeini died on June 3rd 1989. Ali Khamenei was elevated from the position of hojatoleslām to the rank of Ayatollah.That title, and a modification of the Constitution which previously restricted the job to the few people such Montazeri who had the title of Grand Ayatollah, was then enough to promote him as Khomeini’s successor.

Next, Rafsanjani himself was elected Iran’s president on August 3rd 1989.

By September 1989, blaming Iran for Lockerbie would no longer have served the geopolitical interests of the US and UK.

And lo and behold, in September 1989, the investigation entered stage 3 and  switched away from Iran to solely focus on Libya thanks to the mysterious ‘discovery’ of a tiny circuit board known as PT/35(b). The rest is History. (...)

If the SCCRC recommend a new trial, the infamous Zeist verdict does not have a snowball’s chance in hell of surviving.

This should be the very top priority. Once Megrahi is acquitted and the Lockerbie-Libya fiction is erased once and for all, then the time will be right to investigate the true cause of disaster and reveal the identity of the culprits. It is not very hard at all…

France delays removal of UN sanctions against Libya

[What follows is the text of a report published on the BBC News website on this date in 2003:]

The United Nations Security Council has postponed until Friday a vote to lift more than a decade of sanctions against Libya, following French objections.

The draft resolution - tabled by Britain and Bulgaria - calls for an immediate end to a ban on arms sales and air links with Tripoli, imposed after the bombing of an aircraft over Scotland in 1988.

Libya has admitted responsibility for the Lockerbie bombing, and has offered $2.7bn to relatives of the 270 victims.

But France asked the Council to delay the vote over what it described as inadequate compensation from Libya for the bombing of a French airliner in 1989.

"In the absence of a fair agreement between the families and the Libyan side - which seems at this stage to be within reach - France would have no other choice than to oppose the draft resolution," a French foreign ministry spokesman said in a statement before the Council met.

Both Britain and the United States have said Libya has met all the requirements to have the sanctions removed.

The sanctions were suspended in 1999 after Libya handed over two men accused of the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 above the town of Lockerbie in which 270 people died.

Libya agreed on a settlement for the victims' families, but the figure overshadowed the $33m compensation Tripoli awarded relatives of 170 people killed when a French UTA flight was bombed over Niger in September, 1989.

French authorities have been negotiating with Libya for an improved deal and have threatened to block the resolution unless an agreement is struck.

"What we hope is that the vote will be a little bit more delayed to obtain a settlement, and if the British insist on calling for a vote, we hope that France will veto the resolution," said Francoise Rudetzki, a representative of the French victims' families.

The French foreign ministry has said the victims' relatives will have the final say on any deal.

The vote had already been delayed to give France more time to resolve the issue.

Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi has been hoping for an end to the sanctions, which have isolated Libya from the international community for many years.

Libya has never accepted responsibility for the downing of the UTA flight, but agreed to pay compensation after a Paris court convicted six Libyans of the bombing in absentia.

[RB: The sanctions were eventually lifted by the Security Council on 12 September 2003.]

Early report that Lockerbie investigation pointing to Libya

[Pan Am 103 Clue Leads to Libyans : Terrorism: US and Scottish investigators now believe that the regime of Moammar Kadafi carried out the jet bombing that killed 270 is the headline over a lengthy report by Robin Wright and Ronald Ostrow that was published in the Los Angeles Times on this date in 1991. It reads as follows:]

The clue that turned the case was a microchip, a tiny piece of a triggering device to detonate a bomb.

From it, American and Scottish investigators found a new trail that refuted the conclusions of almost two years of arduous legwork by thousands of agents worldwide -- and eventually changed major assumptions about the downing of Pan Am Flight 103 over a small Scottish village just four days before Christmas, 1988.

A key breakthrough, which came just as the largest international criminal probe in history neared an impasse, was almost a fluke. A "brilliant young CIA analyst," as one insider described him, decided to try a new hypothesis: Could someone besides the widely suspected culprits -- Palestinian radicals, their Syrian patrons or Iranian militants -- have been involved?

The analyst started with a hunch.

He searched for a "signature" that would match the Pan Am bombing with earlier incidents to prove his suspicions. Culling through CIA files, he came up with the 1984 bombing of a French UTA airliner in Chad. A premature explosion blew up the baggage compartment while the plane was still on the ground and wounded 27 people.

He also found a link with the 1986 attempt to blow up the US Embassy in Togo. Officials in Lome, the Togolese capital, had arrested nine people with two suitcases full of plastic explosives.

But the biggest find was an obscure case in Senegal involving the arrest of two men at Dakar airport in February, 1988. In their possession were 20 pounds of sophisticated Semtex plastic and TNT explosives, weapons and several triggering devices.

The analyst's hunch was right.

In all three cases, the "signature" was distinctly Libyan.

In Senegal, the two men who were arrested -- Mohammed Marzouk, alias Mohammed Naydi, and Mansour Omran Saber -- were both agents of Libyan intelligence. And the triggering devices in their possession matched the microchip fragment from the Pan Am bomb.

The connection has since provided a new set of answers to how and why Pan Am 103 blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, and who masterminded the blast.

Based on the forensic breakthrough and the links with earlier cases, investigators now believe:

* The regime of Moammar Kadafi carried out the bombing. Libyan intelligence, headed by Abdullah Sanussi, orchestrated the plot.

* The primary motive was revenge for the 1986 US bombing of Tripoli in which about 40 people, including Kadafi's adopted daughter, were killed. "The notion that the 1986 bombing of Tripoli deterred Libyan terrorism is greatly flawed," a leading counterterrorism expert concluded.

* The mysterious bag carrying the bomb-laden Toshiba radio-cassette player on the blown-up Pan Am 103 came from Malta. Investigators believe the bomb was probably flown on an Air Malta flight to Frankfurt, Germany -- although the passenger and cargo log has disappeared. In Germany, the cassette player was loaded on Pan Am 103 as an interline bag, unattached to any passenger.

Vital missing pieces in the puzzle finally fell into place. "We followed a lot of leads that looked promising at the beginning but turned out to be nothing," a counterterrorism specialist said. "All the streets followed down to dead ends."

The breakthroughs mean that, unlike the unsolved cases of half a dozen terrorist spectaculars against US targets in the 1980s, the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 may go to court.

Assistant Atty Gen Robert S Mueller III, who heads the Justice Department's Criminal Division and has been meeting frequently with the FBI on the investigation, appears poised to take the case to a grand jury, according to US officials.

Should the grand jury return sealed indictments, the biggest obstacle may not be just arresting those involved. US authorities already are working with French police now seeking to apprehend one of the Libyan suspects somewhere in North Africa, the officials said.

The problem instead may be competition over which country will get them for trial. French intelligence now believes yet another terrorist attack -- the 1989 bombing of UTA Flight 772 over the West African country of Niger -- was also directed by Libyan intelligence.

Although the method differed in each case, the signature was once again the telltale clue. The UTA explosive, part of which did not blow up and was retrieved from the Sahara desert, was one of five "suitcase bombs" that investigators believed Libyan intelligence purchased earlier from the notorious Mideast bomb maker Abu Ibrahim.

The primary motive, French officials suspect, was revenge for French aid that enabled Chad -- where the UTA flight took on most of its passengers -- to rout Libyan troops occupying parts of the neighboring state in 1987. The bomb was probably loaded in Brazzaville, the Congolese capital where the flight originated.

The new evidence on the Pan Am bombing, which began to emerge last summer, contradicts the longstanding belief that it was linked to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC) headed by Ahmed Jibril. The radical PFLP-GC, based in Syria, is outside the PLO umbrella.

The original case was based on the arrest of a cell of 16 operatives in Germany two months before the 1988 Pan Am bombing. The group was found to have five sophisticated bombs, especially designed to blow up aircraft, hidden in electronic equipment.

From his base in Damascus, Jibril was also known to have worked closely with Iran, where he frequently traveled. Investigators believed that Tehran commissioned the PFLP-GC to target an American plane in retaliation for the accidental 1988 US downing of Iran Air Flight 655 over the Persian Gulf in which 290 people died.

The crucial clues that changed the direction of the probe were the detonators. The Palestinian group's detonators were all Czech-made. They were attached to altimeter devices that were set to go off once a plane reached a certain altitude.

But, as forensic experts discovered, the detonator fragment that was culled from the wreckage of Flight 103, which had been scattered over 845 square miles of Scottish countryside, had important discrepancies.

It was of Swiss manufacture--from the same firm that had made the triggering devices that were found on the Libyan agents in Senegal. And it was attached to an ordinary timer that had been set to go off at a certain hour.

The "fingerprints" -- as forensic experts call the telltale characteristics of sophisticated explosive devices -- of the Pan Am bomb and the PFLP-GC bombs were vastly different. But the fingerprint of the Pan Am bomb was identical to the devices carried by the Libyan agents who were caught in Senegal.

Unfortunately, Senegal freed the Libyan agents, who were never formally charged, in June, 1988. US officials believe their release was part of a package deal in exchange for ending Libyan support for Senegal's opposition forces and for restoring diplomatic relations between the two countries, which had been severed eight years earlier.

At the time, the State Department issued a largely unnoticed -- but perhaps tragically prescient -- official comment: "We are extremely disappointed by Senegal's action, which raises questions about that country's commitment to the struggle against international terrorism."

Six months later, all 259 people on board Pan Am 103 and 11 others on the ground died when the New York-bound plane, flying 31,000 feet over Scotland, exploded just 38 minutes after takeoff from London's Heathrow Airport.

Crucial evidence held by Senegalese authorities also subsequently disappeared. US investigators have had to rely on photographs of the Libyan agents' materiel to match up the fingerprints of the two bombs.

US officials are unwilling to say where the two Libyans are today, but there are hints that they may be suspects in the Pan Am case. Investigators do believe, however, that the same top Libyan intelligence officials -- including Sanussi -- masterminded both the operation that was uncovered in Senegal and the Pan Am bombing.

Sanussi has been a constant headache to counterterrorism officials in the United States, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, a well-placed US source said. In 1986, he was sentenced in absentia by an Egyptian court to 10 years' imprisonment for conspiring to assassinate a group of prominent Libyan exiles.

Sanussi also reportedly makes regular use of Libyan Arab Airlines, the national carrier, as a cover for intelligence and terrorist activities. He is believed to have recruited baggage-handlers and airport personnel in Europe and Africa to facilitate his operations.

The new case against Libya has effectively absolved Syria, the PFLP-GC's primary sponsor, of involvement in the Pan Am bombing, counterterrorism officials say.

But neither Damascus nor Jibril has been cleared of plotting terrorist activities. US officials also believe the arrests that broke up the radical Palestinian cell operating in Germany probably foiled what could have been an even bigger terrorist spectacular: the bombing of three other planes over a period of only a few days.

Counterterrorism analysts suggest that one of the Palestinian group's targets was an Iberia Airlines flight from Madrid to Israel via Barcelona. Among its scheduled passengers were members of an Israeli sports team.

A former US intelligence official says that PFLP-GC operatives also had surveyed the Pan Am counter at Frankfurt airport, although no evidence indicated specific plans against Flight 103 as one of the three planes.

The biggest outstanding question in the investigation is what role, if any, Iran may have played, several key US sources say.

"Unlike the connection established between Iran and Jibril, we have nothing to prove Iran's link with Libya," one official said. "But some still believe there's a link (that) we haven't found yet."

Another added: "I'll go to my grave believing Iranians had a role in Pan Am 103."

By contrast, before the latest breakthrough, investigators felt they had a strong circumstantial case of Iranian links with the PFLP-GC cell on the Pan Am bombing.

Through electronic intercepts, intelligence services had monitored messages from Iranian officials known for their militancy who expressed concern after arrests of the PFLP-GC cell. They apparently were worried about the implications for an operation they wanted carried out.

Investigators initially thought the PFLP-GC and Libyan plots were directly connected. One early scenario suggested that Iran funded two separate cells for the same operation. The second cell was to provide a backup if the first one failed.

But investigators have increasingly moved away from the so-called "Cell A, Cell B" scenario.

So far, investigators have no evidence from intercepts or secret meetings of direct contact between Libya and Iran. Indeed, relations between Tripoli and Tehran have been erratic.

But if the PFLP-GC and Libyan plots were not linked, the implications are even more serious. "You have to be terrified that there were two groups out there in the fall of 1988 plotting to bomb planes," the well-placed official said. "That's even scarier."

[RB: It was just under five months later that it was announced by the prosecution authorities in Scotland and the United States that charges were being brought against Abdelbaset Megrahi and Lamin Fhimah.]

UN Security Council imposes sanctions on Libya

[On this date in 1992 the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 748. What follows is the text of the relevant Wikipedia article:]

UN Security Council Resolution 748, adopted unanimously on 31 March 1992, after reaffirming Resolution 731 (1992), the UN Security Council decided, under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, that the Government of Libya must now comply with requests from investigations relating to the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie and UTA Flight 772 over Chad and Niger, calling on Libya to cease all forms of terrorist action and assistance to terrorist groups. To this end, the Council imposed sanctions on Libya until Libya complied.

The resolution decided that, from 15 April 1992, all Member States should:

(a) deny permission of Libyan aircraft to take off from, land in or overfly their territory if it has taken off from Libyan territory, excluding humanitarian need;

(b) prohibit the supply of aircraft or aircraft components or the provision or servicing of aircraft or aircraft components;

(c) prohibit the provision of weapons, ammunition or other military equipment to Libya and technical advice or training;

(d) withdraw officials present in Libya that advise the Libyan authorities on military matters;

(e) significantly reduce diplomatic and consular personnel in Libya;

(f) prevent the operation of all Libyan Airlines offices;

(g) deny or expel Libyan nationals involved in terrorist activities in other states.

The Council called upon Member States to strictly observe the sanctions, and established a Committee of the Security Council that would seek information from Member States on how they are implementing the Resolution, ways to improve the effectiveness of the embargoes and consider any requests from states that experience problems as a result of the sanctions. It urged full co-operation from all States with the Committee, and decided that the Council should review the embargo every 120 days.

Resolution 748 was adopted by 10 votes to none against, with five abstentions from Cape Verde, China, India, Morocco and Zimbabwe. By passing the resolution under Chapter VII, Libya was bound by the provisions of the Council even if they were in conflict with the Montreal Convention.

Libya refused to comply with the current resolution or Resolution 731, and the Council responded by adopting more extensive measures in Resolution 883 (1993).

While most Americans refuse to accept Megrahi was innocent, it happens to be true

[What follows is the text of an item originally posted on this blog on this date in 2009:]

Susan Lindauer interview

The Intelligence Daily today carries an extended interview by Michael Collins with Susan Lindauer. One section reads as follows:

'Collins: What first triggered your concern about a possible attack involving airplanes and the World Trade Center? How did Lockerbie figure into the 9/11 warning?

'Lindauer: The Lockerbie Trial in the year 2000 got us thinking of what the next terrorist scenario would look like. The bombings of Pan Am 103 in December, 1988 and UTA (French airlines) in September, 1989 were the last attacks involving airplanes prior to September 11, 2001. Our team worried openly that the Trial of the two accused Libyans would inspire a sort of "tribute attack" to the success of Lockerbie.

'The problem is that while most Americans have refused to accept that Libya's man, Mr Megrahi was innocent of the crime, it happens to be true. And terrorists groups know that. They know very well who was responsible for planting the bomb on Pan Am 103, and they know that those individuals have never been brought to justice. Indeed, throughout the Trial, when the US made such a poor showing of forensic evidence against the accused Libyans, that US failure was gossip throughout the Middle East. As Dr [Richard] Fuisz used to say, terrorist groups thought that for all the mighty resources of US Intelligence, the US was either too stupid to catch them. Or we were afraid because the real terrorists are "too big."

'Either of those beliefs stood to create a huge and irresistible provocation to the younger generation of jihadis. It was an easy step to anticipate that younger terrorists would be inspired to launch a tribute attack to the "heroes" who came before them. On that basis, we drew up an extreme threat scenario that the next major attack would most likely involve airplane hijackings or airplane bombings.

'That is exactly what happened by the way. Back in the 1980s, Osama bin Laden called Ahmed Jibril "a hero" and "the greatest fighter against Israel who ever lived."

'Sure enough, my own extensive sources in the Middle East have repeatedly told me that Ahmed Jibril was the true mastermind of Lockerbie - and so we find the 9/11 puzzle fits together exactly.'

[RB: The Intelligence Daily website no longer seems to exist. However, the interview can be read in full here.]

Legality of UN Security Council Lockerbie resolutions

[On this date in 1992 the International Progress Organisation submitted to the United Nations Security Council a memorandum signed by Professor Hans Kőchler contesting the legality of the requirement imposed on Libya by Security Council Resolution 731 (21 January 1992) to extradite the Lockerbie suspects to the United States or the United Kingdom for trial. The memorandum reads in part:]

1.     Security Council resolution 731 (1992) is not in conformity with the requirements of Article 33 of the Charter of the United Nations regarding the peaceful settlement of disputes between Member States. Article 33 requires that the parties "shall, first of all, seek a solution by negotiation, inquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement ...".

2.  The Security Council - acting under Chapter VI of the Charter of the United Nations, as required - did not pay proper attention to the specifications of Article 36, paragraph 3, according to which the Council, when making recommendations, should consider "that legal disputes should as a general rule be referred by the parties to the International Court of Justice".

3.  The procedure in adopting the above-mentioned resolution was not in conformity with the stipulation of Article 27, Paragraph 3, of the Charter according to which, in decisions under Chapter VI, a party to a dispute shall abstain from voting. This obligation in the present dispute clearly exists for the United States of America, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and France.

4.  In its letter of 18 January 1992, Libya, in regard to arbitration of the present dispute, has formally invoked article 14 of the Montreal Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against the Safety of Civil Aviation. The Convention establishes and controls the legal obligations of Contracting Parties, including the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Libya, in connection with legal proceedings related to the destruction of PanAm flight 103 and UTA flight 772. Since all the members of the Security Council are parties to the Convention, they therefore have an obligation to do nothing that would interfere with or prejudice the arbitration process. As international relations within the United Nations framework are based on the rule of law, the countries concerned should fully apply the procedures of the Montreal Convention as the chosen way for addressing this international dispute.

5.  Libya, the United Kingdom and the United States have also ratified article 14 of the Montreal Convention according to which the present dispute may be referred to the International Court of Justice by any of the parties if, within six months from the date of the request for arbitration, the parties are unable to agree on the organization of arbitration. The United States and the United Kingdom are therefore obligated to proceed in accordance with the arbitration provisions of article 14. To date they failed to do so, thereby frustrating the treaty and the method provided by international law through the Montreal Convention for addressing acts of terrorism against international civil aviation. If they reject arbitration formally or de facto in violation of the treaty, then the matter should be submitted to the International Court of Justice as the legal and specific means of determining obligations of Parties under the Convention.

6.  Libya has performed its duties under the Montreal Convention, including its obligation under article 5, Paragraph 1. Libya immediately exercised its jurisdiction over the two alleged offenders, it notified the other Parties that the suspects were in custody and that immediate steps had been taken to institute a preliminary inquiry.

7.  All Parties required were notified of the initiation of the preliminary inquiry and requested to cooperate with the Libyan judicial authorities. These authorities made the same request in official communications to the Attorney-General of the United States of America, the Foreman of the Grand Jury in the District of Columbia in the United States, and the French examining magistrate. As of this date, although obligated under the Montreal Convention, all of the requested Governments and officials have failed to respond. Until their evidence can be assessed, Libya is unable to complete the analysis that the Montreal Convention requires. Therefore, the United States and the United Kingdom are frustrating the treaty. Under the circumstances, the insistence by Security Council members on the extradition of the two suspects is in violation of article 7 of the Convention.    

8.  For the Security Council to deal with the matter to which Council resolution 731 (1992) refers is unprecedented in the United Nations history. The question of extradition in relation to tragic incidents that are several years old is essentially legal in nature. For the Council to endeavor to adjudicate such matters is beyond its power and its capacity. Such matters must be dealt with in accordance with the relevant international legal instruments that apply, and not in a highly politicized context. The Montreal Convention has for 20 years governed unlawful acts against the safety of international civil aviation. The International Court of Justice has jurisdiction to determine violations of the Convention. The Security Council should take no action which would interfere with legal procedures and/or which could aggravate the present dispute among Member States.

The International Progress Organization expresses the hope that the Security Council will take no action that could be seen as justifying aggressive acts by Member States in connection with the present dispute.

Having taken note of the resolutions adopted by the League of Arab States and by the Organization of the Islamic Conference, we appeal to the Security Council not to take any measure which would jeopardize an independent legal investigation of the case, and to support a policy of constructive dialogue to contain the present crisis. Only this would be in conformity with the requirements of reviving the Charter of the United Nations as an instrument to establish a new world order of democracy, peace and justice for all nations, large and small.

[RB: Those interested in the legality of the resolutions of the UN Security Council regarding Lockerbie, can find a discussion by me here.]

UN Security Council requires Libya to comply with US/UK demands

[On this date in 1992 the United Nations Security Council passed its first resolution concerning Libya and the destruction of Pan Am 103 (UNSC Res 731). It reads as follows:]

The Security Council,

Deeply disturbed by the world-wide persistence of acts of international terrorism in all its forms, including those in which States are directly or indirectly involved, which endanger or take innocent lives, have a deleterious effect on international relations and jeopardize the security of States,

Deeply concerned by all activities directed against international civil aviation and affirming the right of all States, in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and relevant principles of international law, to protect their nationals from acts of international terrorism that constitute threats to international peace and security,

Reaffirming its resolution 286 (1970) in which it called on States to take all possible legal steps to prevent any interference with international civil air travel,

Reaffirming also its resolution 635 (1989) in which it condemned all acts of unlawful interference against the security of civil aviation and called upon all States to cooperate in devising and implementing measures to prevent all acts of terrorism, including those involving explosives,

Recalling the statement made on 30 December 1988 by the President of the Council on behalf of the members of the Council strongly condemning the destruction of Pan Am flight 103 and calling on all States to assist in the apprehension and prosecution of those responsible for this criminal act,

Deeply concerned over results of investigations which implicate officials of the Libyan Government and which are contained in Security Council documents that include the requests addressed to the Libyan authorities by France, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America in connection with the legal procedures related to the attacks carried out against Pan Am flight 103 and UTA flight 772 (S/23306, S/23307, S/23308, S/23309, S/23317),

Determined to eliminate international terrorism,

1. Condemns the destruction of Pan Am flight 103 and UTA flight 772 and the resultant loss of hundreds of lives;

2. Strongly deplores the fact that the Libyan Government has not yet responded effectively to the above requests to cooperate fully in establishing responsibility for the terrorist acts referred to above against Pan Am flight 103 and UTA flight 772;

3. Urges the Libyan Government immediately to provide a full and effective response to those requests so as to contribute to the elimination of international terrorism;

4. Requests the Secretary-General to seek the cooperation of the Libyan Government to provide a full and effective response to those requests;

5. Urges all States individually and collectively to encourage the Libyan Government to respond fully and effectively to those requests;

6. Decides to remain seized of the matter.

[RB: Libya’s failure to comply led in March 1992 to a further Security Council Resolution imposing sanctions.]