Former Libyan militants now wage battle within homeland to discredit al-Qaeda

Libya released hundreds of militants in March, including leaders of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, in hopes of rehabilitating them. (Sudarsan Raghavan/the Washington Post)

By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, May 31, 2010; A06

TRIPOLI, LIBYA -- His life as a militant began with a call to holy war. It ended inside a prison in his native Libya. In between, Sami al-Saadi orchestrated attacks against Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi, moved in Osama bin Laden's inner circle and befriended Mohammad Omar, the Taliban leader.

Released from prison in March after he renounced violence, Saadi and other top leaders of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group are now waging an ideological battle to de-radicalize extremists and discredit al-Qaeda.

"Let's leave Libya's dark chapter behind us," Gaddafi's son Saif al-Islam said the day Saadi was set free.

Libya, itself a former sponsor of terrorism, has joined a small but growing number of Arab and African nations that are using religion-based rehabilitation programs to isolate al-Qaeda and inoculate Muslims from bin Laden's narrative. Scores of militants have been released under the program, and U.S. officials say they are watching to see whether such models can serve as a blueprint for combating extremism at a time when al-Qaeda remains a long-term strategic threat.

"It is a new frontier in the fight against terrorism," said Rohan Gunaratna, head of the International Center for Political Violence and Terrorism Research in Singapore.

Yet Libya's experience also shows the limitations of efforts to reform Islamists who harbor deep-rooted grievances against U.S. policies and have spent their adult lives fighting for what they believed was just under the guidelines of Islam.

At one moment, Saadi seemed to embrace a new beginning. "Perhaps we can convince al-Qaeda not to attack the West," he said.

But he later sounded less sure: "I don't believe bin Laden is calling for the killing of any single civilian."

The scion of a wealthy religious family, Saadi dropped out of college in 1988 to wage jihad, heeding an influential Sunni theologian's call to Muslims to liberate Afghanistan from the Soviets. Saadi said he first went to Saudi Arabia and then to Pakistan along with scores of Libyan fighters. He made his way to Afghanistan, where he met bin Laden at a training camp and was impressed by his "devoutness."

After the Soviets pulled out of Afghanistan, Saadi helped found the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group. The group's goal: to overthrow Gaddafi and turn Libya into an Islamic state. By the late 1990s, the militia had staged dozens of attacks in Libya, including three assassination attempts on Gaddafi.

"There was no way but to face the regime with force," Saadi recalled thinking, a faint smile emerging on his face, haggard and gray from years in prison.

The group thrived under Taliban rule and forged close ties to the radical regime's leaders. But it was divided on al-Qaeda. In several meetings before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, bin Laden urged the Libyan fighters to join him in confronting the West, especially the United States, Saadi and two other senior leaders said in their first extensive interviews with a journalist since their release from prison in March.

Some of the fighters were against the idea, warning that the United States might retaliate against the Taliban.

"We did not have any ambitions to export our conflict outside of Libya," recalled Khalid al-Sherif, the group's military commander.

But others embraced bin Laden's global jihad.

Today, one of the group's leaders, Abu Yahya al-Libi, is the spiritual leader of al-Qaeda's North African branch, al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, which has launched suicide bombings and killed Western hostages.

A deal is offered

After the Sept. 11 attacks, many of the Libyan leaders fled Afghanistan. Pakistani and CIA operatives arrested Sherif in Peshawar in 2003. Saadi was arrested in China in 2004. The group's emir, Abdullah al-Sadeq, was captured in Bangkok in 2004. All three men were handed over to U.S. soldiers and eventually returned to Libya, they and Libyan officials say.

Upon their arrival in Tripoli, each of the men were thrown into a small cell.

In late 2008, the offer from Saif al-Islam Gaddafi arrived: Give up violence and get your freedom.

The government was concerned that Libyans were joining al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb in neighboring Algeria, its birthplace.

The offer was rare in the Arab world, where regimes have long used brutality to suppress political conflicts, and Libyan internal security officials opposed it. But Gaddafi convinced his father that the group no longer posed a threat.

"I want Libya to be a safe place," said the younger Gaddafi, who has no official role in the government but has emerged as an influential voice in fostering national reconciliation.

For the jailed militants, there was little choice. Their group had suffered severe military losses.

Reform efforts

A well-respected moderate Islamist, Ali al-Salabi, was enlisted as a mediator to conduct religious dialogues with the jailed militants. Unlike similar programs in Saudi Arabia and Yemen, which focused on reforming grass-roots militants, Salabi met solely with the group's top leaders, who were expected to guide the fighters under them.

Encouraged by the younger Gaddafi, the leaders wrote a 400-page manifesto renouncing violence, challenging al-Qaeda's philosophies and condemning attacks on Western civilians in Muslim nations.

But some of the leaders who split from the original fold have publicly declared that the group had joined al-Qaeda.

Many of the former fighters said they still believe in waging war against U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. They also consider the conflicts in the Palestinian territories and Somalia, where Islamists are fighting a U.S.-backed transitional government, legitimate forms of jihad.

"When America invades a country, the insurgency is legal and lawful. From a religious point of view, it is permissible and we have to support it," said Sadeq, the group's emir. "And U.S. policies in Israel and other places add fuel to the fire."

Salabi, the mediator, agreed. "Violence against occupation is a sacred act," he said. "It is a sacred jihad."

The U.S. ambassador to Libya, Gene Cretz, expressed concern about such comments. "I don't know how you parse jihad," he said. "If it means that, 'If you don't do it in Libya, you are free to go and do it elsewhere,' that would be a little troubling to us."

It remains to be seen how the former militants will adapt to a Libya that in recent years has moved closer to the West. Saadi said his country is not "an ideal state under Islam." Others demanded strict Islamic sharia laws, with public amputations for convicted thieves and head-to-toe coverings for women.

"I am still a Salafist," said Tarreq Muftah al-Ghunnay, the group's former commander in Jordan, referring to the ultra-strict brand of Islam espoused by bin Laden.

The younger Gaddafi said he was confident the government could keep most of the released prisoners from returning to militancy. But "nobody can guarantee anything 100 percent," he said.

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Memo From Tripoli - Unknotting Father’s Reins in Hope of ‘Reinventing’ Libya

By LANDON THOMAS Jr.

TRIPOLI, Libya — Prying open a closed economy is no easy job, especially if the country in question is Libya — a nation that has spent more than two decades with its back turned to the world. It becomes all the more challenging when doing so means taking on the legacy of your father and fighting an entrenched bureaucracy with little interest in serious change.

Yet that is the goal of Seif al-Islam el-Qaddafi, the son and possible successor to Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, as he sets out to dismantle a legacy of Socialism and authoritarianism introduced by his father 40 years ago.

“It is hard work reinventing a country,” he said in an interview last month, as he slouched on a sofa in his villa in the hills above Tripoli, picking at a tray of fruit including fresh dates brought to him by a black-suited waiter. “But that is what we are doing. We will have a new constitution, new laws, a commercial and business code and now a flat tax of 15 percent.”

In the last few years, Mr. Qaddafi, 37, who has a doctorate from the London School of Economics, flawless English and a bold independent streak, has emerged as the Western-friendly face of Libya and symbol of its hopes for reform and openness. When he was nominated last year to lead a powerful government body overseeing tribal leaders, analysts saw it as a sign of his father’s endorsement.

But in Libya’s opaque politics, little is seldom as it appears. And it is far from clear to what extent the younger Mr. Qaddafi’s vision is official policy or wishful dreaming.

Despite his broad international appeal and evidence of popular support at home, analysts say that resistance to his pell-mell approach to modernization appears to be building.

Recently the government curtailed the operations of two crusading newspapers he backed. His entreaties for Western investment were undercut last month when the government imposed a visa ban on more than 20 European countries hoping to do business here. And the old, bellicose Libya seemed to hold sway last week when Colonel Qaddafi escalated a running feud with Switzerland by declaring a “jihad” against it.

The developments have bolstered the view that the hard-line faction championed by Seif Qaddafi’s equally ambitious older brother, Mutassim, the country’s national security adviser, was gaining ground.

“A lot of people have jumped on Seif’s bandwagon as if he were the future of Libya,” said Dana Moss, a Libya expert and the author of a forthcoming monograph on United States-Libya relations. “But that is not clear yet. In a future Libyan system both Seif and Mutassim will have a say, but the question is who will have more of a say.”

Since Libya agreed to renounce its nuclear weapons, an initiative led by Seif Qaddafi, and began to mend ties with the West in the last decade, experts predicted that the opening of the economy would soon follow, spurred by privatization and an influx of foreign investment beyond the presence of international oil companies.

Those expectations were buoyed last October when Seif Qaddafi was proposed to lead the umbrella grouping of local leaders, a position that would give him, like his brother, a voice in the government and an official platform to further his reform agenda.

But months later, he has yet to accept the job. In his first public comments on the subject in London in January, Seif Qaddafi said that until Libya adopted democratic institutions he would stay on the political sideline.

“I will not accept any position unless there is a new constitution, new laws and transparent elections,” he said. “Everyone should have access to public office. We should not have a monopoly on power.”

Instead, he has continued his high-wire act, using his status to occasionally challenge his father’s ways — pushing for openness, opposing the ubiquitous revolutionary committees, allowing human rights critics into the country — while trying to retain his viability as his father’s successor.

Some analysts see his reluctance to enter government as a calculated strategy to retain the aura of an outsider, to rise above the political infighting just as his father did in 1972 when he removed himself from government and adopted the title Brotherly Leader and Guide of the Revolution.

Free of bureaucratic restraints, Seif Qaddafi has been able to propose far-reaching ideas: tax-free investment zones, a tax haven for foreigners, the abolition of visa requirements and the development of luxury hotels.

“We can be the Dubai of North Africa,” he said, citing Libya’s proximity to Europe (the flight from London to Tripoli is under three hours), its abundant energy reserves and 1,200 miles of mostly unspoiled Mediterranean coastline. In the den of his villa, where a stuffed white tiger lay in watchful repose, a fountain gurgled peaceably nearby and the air was thick with incense, the idea seemed plausible. Libya is wealthier than debt-ridden, oil-poor Dubai. Its $15,000 gross domestic product per person ranks it above Poland, Mexico and Chile, according to the World Bank. The government’s sovereign fund, a reserve of oil revenues, boasts $65 billion. And the government has announced plans to invest $130 billion over the next three years to improve infrastructure.

But a descent into the center of Tripoli offers a bracing dose of reality. The streets are strewn with garbage, there are gaping holes in the sidewalks, tourist-friendly hotels and restaurants are few and far between. And while a number of seaside hotels are being built, the city largely ignores its most spectacular asset, the Mediterranean.

Unemployment is estimated as high as 30 percent and much of the potential work force is insufficiently trained.

“The whole country looks like a construction site,” said Mustafa Fetouri, a political analyst based in Tripoli. “But it is developing and growing Libya’s people, that is the real problem. We are not Dubai.”

Libya’s market economy remains more aspirational than real. On a recent weekday morning at the nascent Tripoli stock exchange, 10 or so brokers sat looking blankly at their screens while a handful of customers waited languorously nearby. Ten companies trade on the exchange, which says it does $400,000 worth of business on an average day.

“The cost of running the stock market is more than the daily trading volume,” said Shokri M. Ghanem, the chairman of the National Oil Corporation, the state oil company.

That scene is unlikely to change until the government releases its tight grip on the economy. But Mr. Ghanem, a former prime minister who supports efforts to open the economy, said the political resistance was formidable and has been bolstered by the world financial crisis. The same oil wealth that would finance Seif Qaddafi’s vision has propped up an entrenched elite vigorously opposed to reform.

“There are certain people high up in the government that are against privatization, even though a majority of Libyans wish to go for a market economy,” Mr. Ghanem said.

That majority includes people like Muhammad Younes, 35, a mechanical engineer in Tripoli who has not had a steady job for years. Libya may be wealthy, but he has nothing to show for it, despite his fluent English and a university education.

“No work, no chances, no job,” he said with a fatalistic shrug. “Yet we have so much money. Something must be wrong.”

Libya: Drop Charges against Journalist - Human Rights Watch

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Reporter Prosecuted for Reporting Sexual Harassment Claims by Abuse Victims

October 27, 2009

(New York) - The Libyan government should investigate allegations of sexual harassment in a state-run residence for women who had been orphaned instead of charging the journalist who reported the story with criminal defamation, Human Rights Watch said today.
On October 21, 2009, Mohamed al-Sareet, a Libyan journalist, wrote on Jeel Libya, an independent news website based in London, about a rare demonstration in Benghazi by women who live in a state-run care residence for women and girls who were orphaned as children, calling for an end to sexual harassment they said they had experienced in the center. The demonstrators were also demanding the return of the center's former director. After the article appeared, the police and then the General Prosecutor's office summoned al-Sareet for interrogation and charged him with criminal defamation.
"Libya should investigate the alleged abuse and ensure the protection of these women instead of intimidating the man who wrote about it," said Sarah Leah Whitson. "A journalist should not have criminal sanctions hanging over his head for doing his job."
In the October 21 demonstration, at least 10 women and girls between the ages of 18 and 27 who live in the care center walked through the streets of Benghazi to the Center's governing body, the Social Solidarity Center, holding up placards calling for the reinstatement of the Care Center's former director, who marchers said had treated them well and protected them.
Several of the women told Libyan journalists that officials who run the center had sexually harassed them and allowed security officers into their rooms at night. One woman said that an official had propositioned her and threatened to beat her if she did not comply. Besides Jeel Libya another Libyan website, Libya al Youm, published photos of the demonstration and interviews with some of the residents.
On October 22, local police summoned al-Sareet to the Hadaek police station for questioning. On October 26, the General Prosecutor's Office summoned him for further questioning and charged him with criminal defamation, which carries a prison sentence. Jeel Libya's director told Human Rights Watch that al-Sareet had received threats to burn down his house to intimidate him into retracting his article.
On October 23, some of the women who had been quoted called another Libyan news website, Al Manara, and denied that administrators had sexually harassed them. Libya al Youm reported that officials had threatened to expel those who demonstrated from the center, and pressured them to retract their statements and to sue al-Sareet for slander. On October 26, Quryna, one of two private newspapers affiliated with Saif al-Islam al-Gaddafi, the son of Libyan leader Mu'ammar Gaddafi, published an article in which several of the women denied that any sexual harassment had taken place. "We are now without honor in the eyes of society after what this journalist did," the paper quoted them as saying.
During a visit to Libya in 2005, Human Rights Watch found widespread official denial that violence against women exists in Libya, and a lack of adequate laws and services, leaving victims of violence without effective remedies and deterring reporting. A group of students conducting a study on sexual harassment in Tripoli in April 2009 had great difficulty in persuading women to talk about their experiences, since some felt it would bring shame on them to discuss it.
Human Rights Watch said that countries have a duty to investigate and prevent sexual harassment, a form of violence against women. Libya was among the first countries to ratify the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa, Article 8 of which requires state parties to adopt all necessary measures to prevent, punish, and eradicate all forms of violence against women. Gender-based violence is a form of discrimination prohibited by the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Libya is party. Furthermore, both the African Charter and the ICCPR require Libya to protect freedom of expression. Journalists should be able to report freely without fear of imprisonment for their writings.
"Official denial and reprisals against journalists is not the way to protect women in Libyan society," said Whitson, "Women should be encouraged to bring forward complaints of sexual harassment and other forms of violence so the government can act to prevent abuses."

Deception Over Lockerbie? - The New York Review of Books

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By Malise Ruthven

In his new book Terrorism: How to Respond,^[*] Richard English, a historian who has written the definitive history of the IRA, argues that terrorism is best understood as a "subspecies of war" that embodies—among other things—"the exerting and implementing of power, and the attempted redressing of power relations."

The furor over the Scottish government's decision to release Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, the convicted Lockerbie bomber, and the speculations surrounding the whole affair prove his point. The festive welcome Megrahi received from President Muammar Qaddafi himself on arrival in Libya was met with predictable fury on both sides of the Atlantic. The explosion aboard Pan Am Flight 103 on December 21, 1988, which caused the Boeing 747 to disintegrate in flames over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, was the worst terrorist atrocity ever to have been perpetrated on British soil. Two hundred and seventy people died, including eleven Lockerbie residents. The majority of the victims, 189 of them, were US citizens returning for the Christmas holidays.

President Obama's spokesman, Robert Gibbs, described the jubilant crowds that greeted the frail figure of the returning Libyan intelligence agent as "outrageous and disgusting." Robert Mueller, director of the FBI—who as assistant attorney general had been involved in the investigation that led to Megrahi's indictment and conviction by a Scottish court sitting in the Netherlands—took the unusual step of releasing the text of a letter he had sent to the Scottish justice secretary, Kenny MacAskill, in which he complained that MacAskill's action, "blithely defended on the grounds of 'compassion,'" would give "comfort to terrorists around the world."

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The devolved Scottish government —under the Scottish National Party (SNP), which has announced its intention to hold a referendum on full independence—has robustly denied claims that business interests or pressures from the UK government had any part in its decision to release Megrahi. Its position was supported—after a lengthy and deafening silence—by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, whom the opposition has accused of "double-dealing" over the Lockerbie affair:

I made it clear that for us there was never a linkage between any other issue and the Scottish government's own decision about Megrahi's future.... On our part there was no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double-dealing, no deal on oil, no attempt to instruct Scottish ministers, no private assurances by me to Colonel Qaddafi. We were absolutely clear throughout with Libya and everyone else that this was a decision for the Scottish government.

In an effort to support their position, the UK and Scottish governments released a pile of documents, including previously leaked correspondence between MacAskill and Jack Straw, his counterpart in London. The British justice secretary explained that in his dealings with the Libyan authorities he had been unable to persuade them to exclude Megrahi from a prisoner transfer agreement between Britain and Libya under which prisoners would serve their sentences in their respective countries. The documents also reveal that when the Libyan minister for Europe told his British counterpart that Megrahi's death in a Scottish prison would have "catastrophic effects" on UK–Libyan relations, he was told that "neither the Prime Minister nor the Foreign Secretary would want Mr. Megrahi to pass away in prison but the decision on transfer lies in the hands of Scottish ministers."

In fact the medical prognosis giving Megrahi less than three months to live provided both governments with a loophole in their dealings with Libya. Scottish prison service guidelines state that compassionate release "may be considered where a prisoner is suffering from a terminal illness and death is likely to occur soon," with a life expectancy of around three months an "appropriate time" to consider release. Doctors had earlier concluded that Megrahi might have a year or more to live, rendering him ineligible for release in time for the celebrations marking the fortieth anniversary of the coup on September 1, 1969, that overthrew the Libyan monarchy and brought Qaddafi, a twenty-seven-year-old army captain, to power.

The three doctors—two British and one Libyan—who produced a revised prognosis in July were paid by the Libyan government. One of them, the British oncologist Professor Karol Sikora, medical director of CancerPartners UK, a private health care organization, admitted that the period of three months had been suggested by the Libyans. After examining Megrahi in prison and looking at the clinical details "in much greater depth" than previous doctors, Sikora concluded that Megrahi's tumor "was behaving in a very aggressive way, unlike [tumors afflicting] most people with prostate cancer" and that "the three-month deadline seemed about right." The Libyan doctor concurred. The third doctor would only say that Megrahi "had a short time to live." After it became clear that Megrahi could not be excluded from the prisoner transfer agreement, it seems the Scottish and British governments actively encouraged him and his legal team to seek a release on compassionate grounds.

At stake, for the British, were contracts for oil and gas exploration worth up to £15 billion ($24 billion) for British Petroleum (BP), announced in May 2007, as well as plans to open a London office of the Libyan Investment Authority, a sovereign fund with £83 billion ($136 billion) to invest. Libya refused to ratify the contracts until Straw abandoned his insistence on excluding Megrahi from the prisoner transfer agreement. Shortly after Brown's statement, Straw admitted—in apparent contradiction to his prime minister—that oil had been "a very big part" of his negotiations. British leaders were also warned that trade deals worth billions could be canceled. "The wider negotiations with the Libyans are reaching a critical stage," Straw wrote to MacAskill in December 2007, "and in view of the overwhelming interests for the United Kingdom I have agreed that in this instance the PTA [prisoner transfer agreement] should be in the standard form and not mention any individual." Within six weeks of the British government's concession, Libya had ratified the BP deal. The prisoner transfer agreement was finalized in May of this year, leading to Libya formally applying for Megrahi to be transferred to its custody.

For the SNP government in Edinburgh, the "compassion loophole" made it possible to avoid authorizing Megrahi's release under an agreement negotiated by London. The decision was widely condemned in Scotland, with the minority SNP administration losing a vote by 73–50 in the Scottish parliament on a government motion that the release of Megrahi on compassionate grounds was "consistent with the principles of Scottish justice." But there was a further twist to this story. Before his release from Greenock prison near Glasgow and his flight to Tripoli in a chartered Libyan jet, Megrahi agreed to drop his appeal against the life sentence he received from the specially convened Scottish court sitting at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands in 2001.

Megrahi has always insisted on his innocence, and doubts about his conviction have been expressed by several influential figures, most notably Dr. Jim Swire, a spokesman for the UK families of Flight 103, whose daughter Flora died in the crash, and Professor Hans Köchler, official UN observer at Megrahi's trial at Camp Zeist. In his reports to the UN secretary-general, Köchler deplored the political atmosphere of the trial and the failure of the court to consider evidence of foreign (i.e., non-Libyan) government involvement that formed part of a special defense—inculpating others—that is available under Scottish law.

He was even more forthright in condemning the rejection of Megrahi's first appeal in March 2002—calling it a "spectacular miscarriage of justice"—which took place at the same time as discussions with Libya over compensation for the victims' families. The presence of a Libyan "defense support team" hampered the efforts of the Scottish defense lawyers, who failed to raise vital questions about the withholding of evidence and the reliability of witnesses. Two notable omissions Köchler highlighted were the alleged coaching of a key prosecution witness by Scottish police and the appeal court's failure to consider evidence of a break-in at the baggage storage area in London's Heathrow airport on the night before the bombing.

Conspiracy theories have plagued the bombing ever since the clearing-up operation when unidentified Americans, thought to be CIA agents, were seen sorting through the debris alongside officially authorized Scottish police. The most plausible theories do not necessarily exonerate Megrahi, but do suggest that at most he was little more than a small cog in a much larger and more complex machine.

A widely held suspicion at the beginning of the investigation pointed toward the culpability of a Palestinian faction, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine–General Command (PFLP-GC), working under the protection of Syria. The theory held that the PFLP-GC, who specialized in aircraft hijackings using semtex bombs concealed in tape recorders, may have been "sub- contracted" by Syria's Iranian allies to bring down Pan Am Flight 103 in revenge for the accidental shooting down of an Iranian civilian airliner by the USS Vincennes in July 1988, just months before the bombing of Flight 103.

At the time Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini vowed that the skies would "rain blood" in revenge for the loss of 290 civilian lives, including 66 children. Two defectors from Iranian intelligence agencies—or alleged defectors—subsequently accused the Iranian government of being behind the attacks for which the PFLP-GC was said to have been paid $10 million. Some analysts have argued that leads pointing toward the Palestinian-Syrian-Iranian connection were purposefully deflected after the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, when Syria became—albeit temporarily—a US coalition ally. Libya, the only Arab state to support Saddam's invasion, remained a more tenable target for exacting exemplary justice.

After a decade of sanctions and interventions by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and South African President Nelson Mandela, the Libyans in 1999 gave up Megrahi and his alleged associate Lamin Khalifah Fhimah, who would later be acquitted. The case against Megrahi hinged on a fragment recovered at Lockerbie of a timing device traced to a Swiss manufacturer, Mebo. The firm had sold timers to Libya that differed in design from those allegedly used in cassette bombs of the type attributed to the PFLP-GC. The clothing in which the bomb was said to have been wrapped inside a suitcase was traced to a shop in Malta that Megrahi was alleged to have visited, traveling under an assumed name, on December 20–21, 1988.

Although the evidence was purely circumstantial (there was no direct evidence that either he or Fhimah had placed the device aboard the aircraft), the judges wrote in their decision that the preponderance of the evidence led them to believe that Megrahi was guilty as charged. He was sentenced to life imprisonment, with a recommended minimum of twenty-seven years, to be served in a Scottish jail. A major reason for US anger at Megrahi's release has been the repeated assurances given by the British government that he would serve out his full term.

In December 2003, as part of its campaign to end UN sanctions and abandon its pariah status, Libya accepted responsibility for the bombing, and agreed to pay compensation to the victims' families—although it continued to maintain Megrahi's innocence, as he had done throughout his trial. His position divided observers: some see his continuing denial as the standard response of a professional intelligence officer, as summarized by the unofficial motto of the CIA's Office of Technical Services—"admit nothing, deny everything, make counter-accusations."

Others, including a significant group of Scottish lawyers and laypersons, take a different view. In June 2007, after an investigation lasting nearly four years, the Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission delivered an eight-hundred-page report—with thirteen annexes—that identified several areas where "a miscarriage of justice may have occurred" and referred Megrahi's case to the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh. The commission considered evidence that cast doubt on the dates on which Megrahi was supposed to have been in Malta as well as the testimony of the Maltese shopkeeper who claimed to have sold clothing to Megrahi. He had changed his testimony several times, and had been shown Megrahi's photograph before picking him out of a line-up. It was expected that the fresh appeal would also consider new evidence about the timing device, as well as the reported break-in at Heathrow airport, which indicate that the bomb could have been planted in London rather than in a suitcase checked from Malta to New York, as the prosecution had claimed.

In July 2007, Ulrich Lumpert, a former engineer at Mebo and a key technical witness, admitted that he had committed perjury at the Camp Zeist trial. In a sworn affidavit he declared that he had stolen a handmade sample of an MST-13 Timer PC-board from Mebo in Zurich and handed it to an unnamed official investigating the Lockerbie case. He also affirmed that the fragment of the timer presented in court as part of the Lockerbie wreckage had in fact been part of this stolen sample. When he became aware that this piece was to be used as evidence for an "intentionally politically motivated criminal undertaking," he said, he decided to keep silent out of fear for his life.

Although it would have been necessary for Megrahi to drop his appeal under the prisoner transfer scheme, this was not a precondition for release on compassionate grounds. Nevertheless it seems likely that he was pressured into abandoning the appeal. Oliver Miles, a former British ambassador to Libya, has suggested that the dropping of the appeal, rather than "a deal involving business," was the real quid pro quo behind Megrahi's release. According to Miles, Scottish legal sources had been talking of a mood of "growing anxiety in the Scottish justice department that a successful appeal...would severely damage the reputation of the Scottish justice system."

Although many British and American victims' families are demanding a fuller inquiry, Megrahi's decision means the end of any formal legal investigation into the Lockerbie atrocity. However, this is unlikely to be the end of the controversy, whatever the unpublicized hopes of the Scottish, UK, and US governments. Mark Zaid, the Washington lawyer who represents thirty American families and launched a lawsuit against the Libyan government, securing compensation of up to $2.7 billion, has announced that he is filing suit under the Freedom of Information Act to try to ascertain what agreements and discussions have taken place between the US and the UK, not just with respect to the release of Megrahi, but dating back to before the 1991 indictment. "It is ironic," he told the BBC, "that in the latest release of documents from the British authorities the US viewpoint was redacted [i.e., parts of it were omitted] at the specific request of my government."

In retrospect, the connection between the downing of the Iranian Airbus in July 1988 and of Pan Am Flight 103 five months later has never been adequately established, and probably never will be. In settlements ending hostilities, justice is often the victim.

— September 9, 2009

Dar Al Hayat - A Libyan message to Morocco

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Sat, 05 September 2009

Mohammad al-Ashab

When Libyan Leader Mu'ammar al-Qaddafi announced that he supports the independence of southern Sudan if its people want to, it was clear that his message goes beyond the Sudanese crisis to the West of North Africa, particularly the issue of Western Sahara, especially since both crises erupted at the same time in the mid-1990s in order to separate the Arab space from its African extension.

Those who are acquainted with Col. Al-Qaddafi realize that he has been keen on giving precedence to the image of the thinking leader over the reality that he is a head of a state who can hit and miss. When a Moroccan court prosecuted some newspapers for criticizing the Libyan leader, the issue was considered closed at this level. On the one hand, this newspaper was unofficial and only reflects the ideas of its publishers. On the other hand, the commitment to principles in the relations among states is not subject to mood swings. It is different when Libya expresses its discontent with some reports published by the Moroccan press, and when Libyan officials go back in time and manipulate the Sahara issue.

It was enough for the Libyan officials to inform the Morocco officials that the leader of the Polisario Front Mohammad Abdelaziz will attend the celebrations of Al-Fateh Revolution in order to avoid any embarrassment. In this case, Morocco's absence would not be more serious that driving it to face a fait accompli. Also, Morocco does not agree to be at the same distance with the Polisario Front, especially since the issue is still on the table of the United Nations.

In its current experience, Libya has replaced resounding slogans with a pragmatic methodology that is closer to understanding the laws of the times. Going backward in dealing with the Sahara issue and southern Sudan just because Libya was displeased with reports published by the press is out of the question. The Libyan role is necessary to help solve the problems of the African continent, not to complicate them. The Libyan Republic might have been forced to deal with the European Union in its current structure, or it might have been exposed to political pressures to ensure a mass rally to mark the 40th anniversary of Al-Fateh Revolution.

However, it realizes that the accession of the "Sahara Republic" to the Organization of the African Unity in 1984 raised political and legal controversies which the efforts of the wise people of African failed to overcome. The evidence is that the Sahara dossier in particular has moved to the corridors of the United Nations, and thus there is still a need for a political solution to the predicament of the African Union, all the more so after many countries suspended their recognition of the "Sahara Republic" and are yearning for a political solution to end the problem.

Likewise, the situation in southern Sudan would not have enjoyed the current dimensions had it not been for the repercussions of the Darfur crisis which put Sudan's unity before the unknown. This can only be faced by consolidating unity and sovereignty in light of respecting ethnic and political pluralism. After all, there are many African and Arab frameworks that can contain the struggle of the brother-enemies in Sudan.

No one wants the relations between Morocco and Libya to deteriorate. Both countries are bound by joint commitments inside the Maghreb Union, which can obviously play a role in encouraging the parties of the Sahara conflict to carry on with negotiations, let alone the fact that its current situation cannot withstand new differences.

It is worth mentioning that while the Maghreb capitals abstain from carrying out any efforts to arrange the appropriate atmosphere for a political solution brokered by the United Nations, international envoy Christopher Ross took the lead and talked with the Maghreb Union Secretariat about the issue. But Col. Al-Qaddafi still heads the current session of the Union, and he had experienced, two years ago, how the Sahara differences reflected negatively on the Maghreb Summit hosted by Tripoli at the time. His position and responsibilities perhaps push him to contemplate over the dreams that fade away of establishing a Maghreb Union, one that is active in its periphery and a partner to its neighbors. The opportunity remains favorable to do something, but not under the circumstances of the protest of the celebration which necessitated the withdrawal of Morocco. And it is not too late!

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Megrahi backs Lockerbie inquiry - BBC

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The man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing has backed calls for a public inquiry into the atrocity.

Speaking to Scotland's The Herald newspaper from his home in the Libyan capital, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi said he was determined to clear his name.

He also said an inquiry would help families of the victims know the truth.

Megrahi, who is suffering from terminal prostate cancer, was released from Greenock Prison in Scotland last week on compassionate grounds.

He returned to a hero's welcome in Libya after serving eight years of a minimum 27 years sentence for murdering 270 people in the December 1988 bombing of Pan Am 103 over the town of Lockerbie, in southern Scotland. The scenes prompted international condemnation.

“ I support the issue of a public inquiry if it can be agreed ”
Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi

The Herald quoted Megrahi as saying he would help Dr Jim Swire, whose 23-year-old daughter Flora died in the disaster and who has frequently called for a full public inquiry, by handing over all the documents in his possession.

In his first interview since being released, Megrahi told The Herald: "I support the issue of a public inquiry if it can be agreed.

"In my view, it is unfair to the victim's families that this has not been heard. It would help them to know the truth. The truth never dies. If the UK guaranteed it, I would be very supportive."

But Megrahi said he believed the UK government would avoid a public inquiry as it would cost a lot of money and also "show how much the Americans have been involved".

He said he dropped his appeal in the Scottish courts because he knew he would not live to see the outcome and was desperate to see his family, and insisted there was no pressure from Libyan or Scottish authorities.

'Interesting position'

And he made scathing comments about the Scottish legal system, but said he was impressed by Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill during their meeting at Greenock Prison, describing him as "very decent".

Megrahi said his priority was now to spend time with his five children.

Lucy Adams, chief reporter of The Herald, told BBC News that Megrahi had looked "incredibly ill and weak" during her meeting with him, but had clearly been anxious for a public inquiry to be held.

Ms Adams said: "I think perhaps for those who are convinced of his guilt it seems interesting that he would back that [an inquiry] and he would hand over the papers he has and the documents he has.

"That seems quite an interesting position from his point of view, because that would indicate he has nothing to hide."

“ He is currently writing an autobiography in which he hopes to convince people of his innocence ”
Lucy Adams The Herald

Ms Adams said Megrahi had been interviewed in his large villa in Tripoli while he was lying on a "hospital-style bed" in his lounge.

She added: "He was surrounded by his family, his children and other relatives, and he seemed incredibly weak and frail. He spent much of the time coughing and having to pause, but seemed determined to talk about his case and the fact that in his opinion, while he will die soon, he said the truth will never die."

"He is currently writing an autobiography in which he hopes to convince people of his innocence. He has documents which have not yet been disclosed to the public, and documents that were being prepared for his appeal which he dropped last week as part of his hopes for returning to Tripoli."

The row over Mr MacAskill's decision to release Megrahi on compassionate grounds intensified on Friday when an ICM Research poll for BBC News said 60% of those questioned thought Mr MacAskill was wrong to release Megrahi, and 57% thought he should have stayed in prison until he died.

Thirty-two per cent said Mr MacAskill was right, 7% did not know, and 1% would not say.

The telephone poll of 1,005 adults took place on Wednesday and Thursday.

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Possible Gaddafi Visit Stirs N.J. Town

Libyan Leader May Pitch Tent There

By Mary Beth Sheridan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi often brings a Bedouin tent along on his foreign trips, and he has pitched one in Cairo, in Rome and next to the Elysee Palace in Paris. But reports that he is planning to set up camp in suburban Englewood, N.J., next month have prompted outrage from U.S. lawmakers and a diplomatic scramble in Washington.

Rep. Steven R. Rothman (D-N.J.), whose district includes Englewood, said Tuesday that he had taken the matter to the State Department and the White House and that they had "strongly urged the Libyan government to have Mr. Gaddafi remain only in New York City" when he visits to address the U.N. General Assembly.

The topic dominated the daily State Department news briefing, with spokesman Ian Kelly saying officials are reaching out to members of Congress and local authorities about the tent. "We're also talking to the Libyans to highlight the concerns that we have and the very raw sensibilities or sensitivities of the families who live in that area," Kelly said.

After decades of animosity, oil-rich Libya and the United States have normalized ties in recent years, as Gaddafi's government renounced support for terrorists and dismantled its nuclear program. Gaddafi's son Mutassim met with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in April as part of an effort to further boost relations.

But American officials were infuriated by the joyful homecoming celebration in Libya last week for the convicted bomber in the attack on Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988. They have warned that relations will suffer if the bomber, Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, who was released from a Scottish prison, continues to be lionized by his government. Thirty-eight of the 270 victims of the attack lived in New Jersey.

Gaddafi's planned visit next month would be his first to the United States since becoming Libya's leader in 1969. He had initially asked if he could pitch his tent in New York's Central Park during the U.N. session, but "we said no," said Jason Post, a spokesman for New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (I).

After reports in local newspapers that the Arab ruler would instead set up the tent on the grounds of a house owned by Libya's U.N. mission in Englewood, a town of 29,000 about 12 miles from Manhattan, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) wrote to Clinton on Monday asking that Gaddafi's visa restrict him to the area around the U.N. headquarters.

Rothman said the Libyans bought the Englewood house in 1982, when he was mayor of the town. At the time, the State Department sent the Libyan government a letter saying the residence was to be used only by the Libyan U.N. ambassador's family and not by Gaddafi, Rothman said.

The congressman said he emphasized to federal officials that those restrictions "should not be waived under any circumstances." His objections stem partly from concerns about local residents' security and partly from "Gaddafi's well-deserved reputation as a murderous dictator who had American blood on his hands," he said.

Kelly, the State Department spokesman, said Tuesday that the Libyan government had not yet decided where Gaddafi would stay.

A Libyan Embassy spokeswoman, Nicole DiCocco, told the Associated Press that Gaddafi's tent might be set up in Englewood, but only for social events, not sleeping. Reached Tuesday by The Washington Post, however, DiCocco referred calls to a public relations firm. A representative there, Molly Conroy, declined to comment.

An Orthodox rabbi who lives next to the Libyan estate said he plans to gather local residents at his home Sunday for a protest against the possible Gaddafi visit.

"Gaddafi has shown his true colors," Shmuley Boteach said. "He has welcomed al-Megrahi as an icon, when this is a cowardly mass murderer."

Megrahi, who has terminal prostate cancer, was freed by Scottish authorities last week on compassionate grounds after serving eight years of a 27-year sentence.