THE PEOPLE of Lockerbie have implored President Bill Clinton not to visit the town on the tenth anniversary of the disaster next year. The calls came amid concerns that his presence on 21 December next year would create a media circus.
The town's two councillors, Marjory McQueen and Stephen Berry, spoke out yesterday after it became known that Dumfries and the Galloway Council convener, Allan Baldwick,had held talks with American victims' families and senior political figures about a possible presidential visit.
Speaking yesterday, the ninth anniversary of the disaster, Mrs McQueen said: "The people of Lockerbie want the tenth anniversary to be marked with quiet dignity and with no razzmatazz.
"I realise, of course, that the occasion will have international significance and there is no way we can say to relatives not to come here. But we want to stop it being a rabble.
"This is the feeling generally in Lockerbie where people are trying to get on with their lives.
Mr Berry said that if President Clinton did visit the town, he hoped he would be encouraged not to go there on 21 December. "The people of Lockerbie do not want a media circus. The big fear is that the whole thing will be taken out of our hands.
"The people of Lockerbie feel the same as those in Hungerford on the tenth anniversary of the shootings there. The feeling is: 'Go away and leave us alone'. But the one main difference is the international dimension. People from 21 different nationalities were killed in the bombing and there are families who will want to be here on the anniversary. If that is how they want to commemorate the occasion that is their choice."
There is a possibility that the visit could be in May, when the president is due in Britain for a G8 finance summit in Birmingham. A decision is expected to be taken by the White House in February.
Mr Baldwick, who is to meet the council's executive committee today to discuss possible arrangements, confirmed that talks had taken place but said: "Nothing has yet been finalised."
Dr Jim Swire, a spokesman for the UK relatives, told The Scotsman last night: "We will of course respect the wishes of the people of Lockerbie in this matter."
He was speaking after a press conference in Edinburgh yesterday at which the Labour MP Tam Dalyell called on Scotland's Lord Advocate, Lord Hardie of Blackhall, to stand aside from the decision-making process on the continuing case against two Libyans suspects who have not been extradited because Libya, despite UN sanctions, says the men would not receive a fair trial in either Britain or the United States.
Mr Dalyell said Lord Hardie should stand aside because he had been a Crown counsel at the fatal accident inquiry into the bombing.
Although Lord Hardie was not Lord Advocate at the time, he was a "somewhat controversial and certainly aggressive counsel" at that inquiry, Mr Dalyell said.
He added: "In the light of what I have heard about the FAI, I deem it right to say that I think it is deeply unsatisfactory that someone who participated in that unsatisfactory FAI should years later be a minister of the Crown making vital decisions in relation to Lockerbie".
The Crown Office last night firmly rejected Mr Dalyell's call, saying Lord Hardie's role at the time had been as a junior lawyer to the then Lord Advocate, Lord Fraser.
A spokesman said: "Every legal procedure in Scotland that involves the Crown involves the Lord Advocate or a representative. To suggest his role in the fatal accident inquiry is in any way incompatible with his current role as Lord Advocate is a misconception about the function of the office of Lord Advocate."
The Crown Office added that such calls were based on a "misunderstanding of his (Lord Hardie's) whole function."
The press conference was called for the relatives of British victims to launch a petition urging the Government to allow the trial of the two Libyans to be held in a neutral country.
The petition calls on parliament and the Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, to offer the two men a trial in the Netherlands or another neutral country under Scottish legal procedures, conducted by an international panel of judges chaired by a Scottish judge.
Dr Swire, whose daughter died in the crash, said the relatives hoped the new Labour government would change the UK's position on a trial, "but we have heard exactly the same phrases coming over again". He added: "We feel sure they are in thrall to a great extent to their civil servants and above all to America."
The relatives were backed by Professor Robert Black of Edinburgh University and Dr David Fieldhouse, from Bradford, West Yorkshire, a forensic medicine expert, who gave evidence at the inquiry.
The two men repeated their calls for a full independent inquiry, saying the original fatal accident inquiry held under Scottish legal procedures was "flawed" as it excluded from its remit areas such as intelligence, and some aspects of aviation security in Britain.
At the inquiry, some Scottish police witnesses criticised Dr Fieldhouse, a police surgeon at the time, claiming the English police and legal routines he used in Lockerbie had hampered their task of formally recording the time and place each body was found and pronounced dead.
Dr Fieldhouse insisted that in the final report of the inquiry the judge backed him and rejected the criticisms, and this left unanswered questions about the time and place where each body was officially found .
Also yesterday, American relatives of victims cast serious doubt about the Government's ability to bring the two Libyans to trial.
Robert Hill, a spokesman for Syracuse University in New York state which lost 35 students in the bombing, said relatives doubted that a trial would be successful or would ever take place because of stalling.
He said: "It wouldn't surprise me if it remained unfinished business for ever more."
It was also reported yesterday that Sean Connery is considering making a film about the Lockerbie disaster, playing a Scottish police chief in charge of the investigation.
Confirming the UK relatives' support for such a project, Dr Jim Swire said last night: "I am delighted Sean Connery is backing it. I have always thought many of the answers about Lockerbie would come through Scotland in some way.
"Although it is classed as a drama documentary I think it may have a helping hand to play in sorting out the enigmas surrounding Lockerbie."
Dr Swire confirmed that scriptwriters had contacted him and his wife Jane, and approached people in Lockerbie.
Fountainbridge Films, which is named after the district of Edinburgh where Mr Connery was born, said the Lockerbie idea was being considered but added it was "way too early to say" if a film would be made.
The film is the second planned about the Lockerbie disaster. An American company is still in the early stages of putting together its film, which was first suggested three years ago.
This news was taken from THE SCOTSMAN, Scotlands leading newspaper....
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