Lockerbie bombing: Libyan detained by US authorities
The Lockerbie attack in December 1988 was the deadliest ever committed on British territory.
AFP/Archivos
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Abou Agila Mohammad Massoud has been prosecuted by the United States since 2020 as part of the investigation into this attack on a PanAM plane over Lockerbie, Scotland, in December 1988. The attack left 270 dead.
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Abou Agila Mohammad Massoud is suspected of having assembled and programmed the bomb that detonated PanAm Flight 103.
The news of the arrest and detention by the American authorities of this former member of the intelligence services of Muammar Gaddafi was first given via a press release from the Scottish prosecution.
It was confirmed by a spokesperson for the US Department of Justice.
"
He must appear in court in the District of Columbia
", the capital Washington, he said in an email to Agence France-Presse.
No date has been announced.
The circumstances surrounding the surrender of the suspect to US authorities have also not been specified.
The Lockerbie bombing targeted a transatlantic flight from London to New York.
The aircraft, a Boeing 747, exploded on December 21, 1988 over this Scottish village, killing 259 passengers and crew and 11 people on the ground.
Only one person has been convicted for this attack: the Libyan
Abdelbaset Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi, who died in 2012
.
He had always maintained his innocence.
It was not until December 2020, 32 years after the tragedy, that American justice announced that it would prosecute Abou Agila Mohammad Massoud.
$2.7 billion in compensation
The Lockerbie attack is the deadliest ever committed on United Kingdom territory, but also the second deadliest against Americans (190 dead) after the attacks of September 11, 2001. The regime of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi had officially recognized its responsibility in 2003 and paid 2.7 billion dollars in restitution to the families of the victims.
The investigation was relaunched in 2016, when American justice learned that Abu Agila Mohammad Massoud had been arrested after the fall of the dictator and allegedly made a confession to the intelligence services of the new Libyan regime in 2012. Last year, the Scottish justice rejected the appeal filed by the family of al-Megrahi, considering that there "
was no miscarriage of justice
".
Justice had also swept away the defense of the family of the condemned, who considered that documents related to the case, which the British authorities refuse to declassify, would have made it possible to lead to a different verdict.
(
With
AFP)
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