Lockerbie bombing: US to charge Pan Am Flight 103 suspect | UK News



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The United States is expected to drop charges against another suspect in the 1988 Lockerbie airline bombing that killed 270 people, US media report.

A Libyan intelligence officer identified as Abu Agila Mohammad Masud is being held in Libya and will be extradited to the United States for trial, the Wall Street Journal said.

Most of the victims on the flight from London to New York were US citizens.

In 2001, Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was the only person convicted of the attack on Pan Am Flight 103 after it blew up over the Scottish city of Lockerbie.

He was sentenced to life imprisonment, but the Scottish authorities released him on humanitarian grounds in 2009, when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Later he died in Tripoli.

The new case, which will be released in the coming days, is likely to be of special importance to United States Attorney General William Barr, who is leaving his post next week – since it is the second time that he has supervised charges related to the attack.

He held the same job when the Justice Department charged Megrahi and a second Libyan, Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, with building a plastic bomb with a timer before hiding it inside a suitcase and placing it on an Air Malta flight.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi
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Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted in 2001, 13 years after the attack.

The suitcase was then transferred to Pan Am Flight 103.

When the indictment was released in 1991, Barr said: “We will not rest until all those responsible are brought to justice. We have no higher priority.”

In 1992, the UN Security Council imposed sanctions for arms sales and air travel against Libya to force Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, the then leader of the country, to hand over the two suspects.

Fhimah was acquitted, but Megrahi was imprisoned for life with a minimum period of 27 years.

The sanctions were later lifted after Libya agreed to a $ 2.7 billion (£ 1.95 billion) compensation deal with the families of the victims.

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