The official website of Dr Jim Swire and Lockerbie researcher Peter Biddulph
his conviction and August 2009 release on compassionate grounds
A chapter from the varied career of Vincent Cannistraro died yesterday. Congressman Charles Wilson featured in the film "Charlie Wilson's War", the story of covert CIA funding of the Afghanistan Mujahedeen, later to become the Taleban. With a 400 mile "back door" frontier with Iran, Afghanistan then and now forms a key part of America's intentions to control the Caspian Sea gas and oil zones of Eastern Europe and Asia. In 1985 Cannistraro wrote an email to his CIA colleagues detailing his discussions with Wilson to secretly transfer $300 million to the Mujahedeen war chest. In 1985 too Robert McFarlane drafted America's secret policy on Iran and the potential of the Caspian Sea oil and gas zones for the furtherance of US strategic interests. The CIA were tasked to follow this up with regular assessments and appropriate covert campaigns.
Internationally respected Explosives Expert claims Hayes fragment to be "an impossibility."
An internationally respected security and explosives expert has in secret carried out simulations of the supposed Lockerbie suitcase and bomb. Following twenty explosions, each with differing amounts of Semtex including several of 300 grammes, he has claimed that circuit boards constructed with a higher fire resistance than an MST-13 board made by MEBO were totally destroyed. An account of the his experiments and claims will be included in our book Moving the World.
The two key elements of the conviction of al-Megrahi are:
1. The identification of Al-Megrahi: In an extraordinary development in 2005, Maltese shopkeeper Toni Gauci was exposed as an unreliable witness by the man who in 1991 indicted Megrahi, former Scottish Lord Advocate Peter Fraser. In Fraser's words, Gauci was "an apple short of a picnic." And yet the judges trusted Gauci's contradictory and confused evidence, and ignored the fact that Gauci was on a promise of a multi-million dollar reward if Al-Megrahi was convicted. It is now documented and proved that Gauci was paid at least $2 million for his evidence, and his brother Paul $1 million.
2. The alleged bomb timer fragment: Was it planted to frame Libya for the crime? The fragment's label had been altered by unknown persons. And its finding and examination by Dr Thomas Hayes proved highly suspicious. A series of scientific tests in 2009 have proved that its survival two centimetres from the centre of a high explosive fireball was impossible.
Now more than ever it is imperative that an independent inquiry take place, to examine events before and after the night of the bombing. The opportunity for a second appeal is lost, but the demand for the Truth in this affair remains.
THE BACKGROUND
Terrorists who bombed Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie on 21st December 1988 murdered 270 passengers, crew, and townsfolk of a quiet Scottish town. Among the dead was Flora Swire, aged 24. Two Libyan agents - Abdel Bassett Al-Megrahi and Khalifah Fhimah - were targeted by the CIA and FBI as the guilty men. In a trial held in Holland Fhimah was released with "No Case to Answer". Al-Megrahi was convicted. Much of the world believed that that was where the story ended. Only after twenty years campaigning by Jim Swire, Professor Bob Black and many others did the sensational truth begin to emerge.
Two personalities central to the investigation and trial were . . .
Vincent Cannistraro - CIA task force officer in the brutal 1980s Iran-Contra campaign. Deployed a training manual of invasion and killing of Nicaraguan citizens and officials. Wrote "the anatomy of a lie" to cover up US government involvement in Nicaragua. In 1986 was commissioned by the US President to "Destabilize Libya and destroy the Gaddafi regime". Secretly worked to arm the Afghanistan Mujahadeen and Osama Bin Laden. His chief Admiral Poindexter chaired a top-level meeting - to which Cannistraro had access - to discuss the manufacture of evidence to destabilize the government of Yemen. Head of the CIA Lockerbie team.
Dr Thomas Hayes - Over the 1970s and early 1980s progressed to Head of Department at the British Royal Armaments Research Establishment at Fort Halstead, in the United Kingdom. His testimony was central to the Lockerbie verdict. Yet he and two colleagues conspired to with-hold evidence from the 1974 alleged IRA Maguire Seven trial which would have indicated innocence. The Maguires were freed on appeal after fifteen years in jail. This matter was exposed in the Lockerbie trial, but the judges trusted his word implicitly.
More evidence has since come from...
Former CIA agent, Robert Baer. CIA Middle Eastern specialist.
Worked on the early stages of the investigation into the Lockerbie bombing. Has repeatedly claimed that there was in 1989 "Grade A intelligence" held by America to prove that Iran requested and paid for the Lockerbie bombing. If Baer is correct, then the bomb timer fragment which pointed to Libya must have been planted. More ...
Lord Peter Fraser, Scotland's Chief Law Officer during the investigation and indictments.
Claimed in 1991 that witnesses would "prove the case beyond reasonable doubt." In 2005 he admitted to journalists that his chief witness Gauci was highly unreliable. Then in 2008, when questioned by a Times journalist, Fraser indicated suspicions that key evidence might have been planted with the knowledge of the CIA. More . . .
Shukri Ghanem, Libyan Prime Minister 2003 - 2006.
Has twice said in radio and television interviews that Libya was not responsible and reluctantly paid $2.7 billion compensation only "to buy peace and move forward." More ...
The Human Face of Lockerbie
In this stunning book, we relate events and conversations never previously revealed. In a detailed analysis of the trial and testimony of key witnesses, we demonstrate a breathtaking conspiracy to conceal the truth.
Details and book orders
Professor Robert Black
Professor Paul Rogers,
Bradford
Daniel Ellsberg Website
Professor Noam Chomsky
Professor Hans Koechler
