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A Libyan accused of arming the device that blew up Pan Am Flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988 was indicted in a US court in connection with the bombing that killed 270 people.
Mohammed Abouagela Masud was charged on the 32nd anniversary of the attack, which took place on December 21, 1988, in which all 259 people were killed on the plane and 11 people on the ground. Masud has been described as a former Libyan intelligence officer and one of the main bomb-makers working for the late Libyan dictator, Moammar Gadhafi.
The new charges represent the third Libyan prosecuted in the past 30 years in connection with the Lockerbie bombing. In 1991, two intelligence officials, Abdel Baset al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, were charged.
They were brought to trial eight years later. Megrahi received a life sentence that he served until his release in 2009, and Fhimah was acquitted.
The revelation of the charges against Masud on Monday was the product of a personal mission by US Attorney General William Barr. In one of his first acts during his initial tenure as George H. Bush’s chief prosecutor, he brought the 1991 indictments.
The charges brought against Masud are likely to be Barr’s final act as attorney general in his second term under Donald Trump. He is expected to step down from office on Wednesday.
At a press conference announcing the charges, Barr said: “On this day 32 years ago, a bomb destroyed Pan Am Flight 103 as it flew 31,000 feet over Lockerbie, Scotland. The Lockerbie bombing remains the deadliest terrorist attack in UK history and the second deadliest terrorist attack in the United States ”after 9/11.
