THE REAL AIMS OF THE LOCKERBIE & UTA CASES
By FAN YEW TENG

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Extracted from New Dawn No.27 (Special Edition, 1994)
© 1994 by Fan Yew Teng

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On 21 December 1988, a jumbo jet, Pan Am Flight 103, blew up in the sky over Lockerbie in Scotland, killing all 259 people aboard and 11 persons on the ground.

According to Jeff Jones, writing in the Summer 1990 issue of Covert Action, "By most accounts, investigators believe the crash was caused by a sophisticated bomb - with a time-delay barometrix fuse - placed on the plane by Ahmad Jibril's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PPLP-GC), a Syrian-backed group that rejects PLO efforts to negotiate with Israel."

Jones adds, "Jibril has denied responsibility for the attack. But investigators believe that the PFLP-GC received a large payment from Iran - ABC News has reported $10 million - to carry out the attack to avenge the US downing of an Iranian airbus in which nearly 300 died on July 3, 1988."

However, Paul Hudson, a New York lawyer whose 16-year-old daughter Melina died in the crash, was suspicious of a US government coverup. Hudson, who is the president of 'Families of Pan Am/Lockerbie', one of three groups made up of relatives of the victims, said, "It appears that the government either has the facts and is covering this up or doesn't know all the facts and doesn't want to."

Many Questions

According to Jeff Jones, most of the initial controversy surrounding Pan Am 103 focused on the US government's long standing policy of not informing the general public when an airline, an air corridor or a specific flight has been threatened by terrorist attack. "Pan Am 103", Jones points out, "fit in to all of these categories."

Jones adds: "But there are many other questions percolating just beneath the surface of the investigation." Some of the question are:

* There were, it is now known, at least four, and according to one unsubstantiated report, as many as eight, CIA and other US intelligence operatives returning from Beirut, Lebanon, aboard the plane. The Lockerbie bomb crippled US intelligence efforts in the Middle East. Were the intelligence operatives on 103 the bomb's target?

* A CIA team headed for Lockerbie within an hour of the crash. At least once during the ground search CIA investigators wore Pan Am uniform; and according to one unrefuted allegation, CIA operatives temporarily removed a suitcase from the site that belonged to one of their agents, thereby breaking the Scottish police investigators' "chain of evidence", which could be crucial to any successful prosecutions.

* Also on board Pan Am 103 was Bernt Carlsson, the Swedish U.N. diplomat who had just completed negotiating the Namibian independence agreement with South Africa. He was due in New York the next day to sign the agreement.

* In October 1988 the West German Federal Police, the BKA, raided a suspected terrorist safehouse. During the raid, they found a bomb - hidden in a Toshiba radio - that was virtually identical to the one believed later to have bought down Pan Am 103. All but one of the 16 people arrested were soon released and several of them are now top suspects in the bombing.

* Pan Am was fined more than $600,000 by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for lax security at its baggage-handling facility in Frankfurt (where Flight 103 originated). And according to the West German newsweekly Stern, a Pan Am security official in Frankfurt was spotted after the crash backdating a copy of a crucial FAA memo. The memo described a call placed to the US Embassy in Helsinki in which the caller reportedly warned that a bomb would be smuggled onto a Pan Am aircraft flying from Frankfurt to the United States.

* The most startling and controversial charge to surface around Pan Am 103 comes from a report issued by a little-known New York City-based intelligence group called Interfor, Inc. The company was hired by the law firm representing Pan Am's insurance agents to find out what happened. The Interfor Report was leaked to the press in the autumn of 1989. Its immediate impact was to stall, indefinitely, the approximately 300 civil court cases filed against Pan Am by relatives of the victims. Interfor has charged that a rogue CIA unit in Frankfurt, seeking to make a deal for the release of US hostages in Beirut, was protecting a Middle East heroin smuggling operation being run through Pan Am's Frankfurt baggage operation. The fatal bomb, according to this allegation, was placed on the plane in a suitcase substituted for one that normally would have contained contraband.

* But according to a January 1990 report on Frontline, the PBS news program, the bomb was placed on the plane at London's Heathrow Airport when a baggage handler switched suitcases belonging to CIA officer Matthew Gannon. Frontline believes the planning for the retaliatory bomb attack was already under way when the group learned that several top US intelligence officers would be flying Pan Am 103 out of London's Heathrow Airport. Gannon and two other operatives, having left Beirut by separate routes, may have made a fatal error when they purchased their plane tickets over the counter from a travel agent in Nicosia. According to Frontline, the only piece of luggage not accounted for from the flight belonged to Gannon. Frontline's investigators believe that the intelligence officers were "a strong secondary target" and that a suitcase identical to Gannons was switched at Heathrow.

* And according to syndicated columnist Jack Anderson, President George Bush and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher held a transatlantic phone conversation some time in 1989, in which they agreed that the investigation into the crash should be "limited" in order to avoid harming the two nations' intelligence communities. Thatcher has acknowledged that the conversation took place, but denied she and Bush sought to interfere with the investigation.

The Interfor Report maintains that a Frankfurt-based CIA team was protecting a heroin smuggling operation in hopes of obtaining information about US hostages in Lebanon - the same hostages that sparked the Iran-contra arms-for-hostages scandal. It claims that the drug smuggling ring is headed by Syrian Monzer al-Kasser, and controls at least one Pan Am baggage handler at the Frankfurt airport. Al-Kasser is a known arms and drug smuggler who had received money from two Iran-contra figures, Albert Hakim and Richard Sec-ord, to buy 100 tons of small arms for the Nicaragua contras.

The Interfor Report also explains why a special US hostage rescue team was on board Pan Am 103 when it was destroyed. According to the report, the team, led by Army Major Charles McKee, had learned that the CIA unit in Frankfurt was protecting al-Kasser's drug pipeline. McKee reported to CIA headquarters he feared "... that (his team's) rescue (operation) and their lives would be endangered by the double-dealing."

When CIA headquarters did not respond, the McKee team decided to return home without permission. The Interfor Report states that "their plan was to bring the evidence back to the United States (of the CIA's involvement with al-Kasser and drug dealing)... and publicize their findings if the government covered it up." Agents connected to Al-Kasser through Syrian intelligence saw the McKee team make their travel arrangements back to the US, and, according to the report, Al-Kasser informed his Frankfurt CIA protectors of McKee's plans.

According to Jeff Jones, following the leak of the Interfor Report, Pan Am went before the federal judge hearing the civil suits against the airline and asked to subpoena the CIA, FBI, the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and State Department in an effort to verify Interfor's findings. The Bush government moved to quash the subpoenas on national security grounds. The Justice Department then took the case out of the hand of its local attorneys by sending a team from Washington to handle the litigation.

Fog of Disinformation

Jeff Jones says that "many relatives and reporters feel a fog of disinformation hangs heavy over the crash." Some of the remaining puzzles are:

* Is it that a rogue CIA operation trying to free US hostages by protecting a heroin smuggling ring failed to prevent the bomb from going on board?

* Is it that experienced US intelligence operatives made fatal security mistakes?

* Is the CIA trying to hide the fact that it could not bring its people home from Beirut safely?

"Whatever the answer may be," Jeff Jones points out, "many relatives of the victims fear they will never know what allowed the bombing to happen or see those responsible punished."

In April 1990 a letter to George Bush and Margaret Thatcher, co-signed by Paul Hudson and Jim Swire, co-chairs of "U.K. Families-Flight 103", spoke of the "entirely believable published accounts (that)... both of you have decided to deliberately downplay the evidence and string out the investigation until the case can be dismissed as ancient history."

Another Cover-up

In Washington the President's Commission on Airline Security and Terrorism issued its report on May 15, 1990, leaving many questions about the bombing of Pan Am 103 unanswered. But it did recommend that the US should be more willing to attack suspected terrorists and the states that harbour or support them.

But as Jeff Jones comments, "Threatening military action may be a cynical means for dealing with the anger of relatives of the victims. In April 1989, during a meeting with representatives of the relatives, Bush reportedly offered the unsolicited statement that if 'the fingers (of guilt) point to state terrorism,' there would be a retaliatory strike like the one the Reagan administration launched against Libya."

Jeff Jones reports, "While the Commission harshly criticizes both the FAA and Pan Am, it lets the US intelligence community off the hook. 'The Commission's review showed that no warnings specific to Flight 103 were received by US intelligence agencies from any source at anytime.' it reports. And it repeats testimony presented to the Commission by the CIA claiming that the agency did not send anyone to the (crash) site."

Anyone familiar with the lies of the CIA and American governments will not be surprised.

Moreover, as Jeff Jones tells us, "Indeed, an important part of the Commission's report will remain unknown. Part of the body's conclusions apparently related to a call for more aggressive covert operations intended to prevent or respond to terrorist acts - was sent to the President in a classified letter."

The Libyan Scapegoat

Then, suddenly in the last week of June 1991, two and a half years after the incident, The Washington Post carried some allegations that Libya could have been involved in the bombing of Pan Am 103.

On 1st July 1991 The Australian carried a report from London by James Dalrymple of The Sunday Times stating that there was now "proof" that Libya was behind the Lockerbie bombing. "Lord Fraser of Carmyllie, the Scottish Lord Advocate in charge of the Lockerbie inquiry, is expected to accuse Libya of involvement later this year."

But, Dalrymple pointed out, "Relatives of the victims are now calling for a Congressional inquiry over claims that the US government is attempting to minimise the role of Iran and Syria in the attack. They say Libya is now blamed solely for the bombing because of changing US alliances in the Middle East."

Since the tragedy in December 1988, a number of parties, as pointed out earlier, have been identified as the perpetrators. In fact, within weeks of the bombing, The Independent newspaper of London ran a story linking it to Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency. Then many observers believed that it had all the markings of an Israeli terrorist operation that was to be blamed on the Palestinians or a radical Arab state in an attempt to turn world opinion against the Palestinian struggle.

However, it was not long before the "Israeli connection" quickly vanished from the headlines and the official version was that the bombing was carried out by a Palestinian organisation commissioned by Iran. Later Syria was added to the equation.

Now, with the Gulf War and resulting alliance changes in the Middle East, both Syria and Iran have been cleared of suspicion and Libya has been named as the guilty party!

The changing US alliances in the Middle East were forged before the Gulf War to isolate Iraq. Suddenly, foes like Iran and Syria became "friends", "partners" or "neutrals". Syria was given a billion dollars' worth of arms aid through a variety of back doors, mostly Gulf states. Iran got its first loan from the World Bank since the 1979 Islamic revolution: the Bank approved US$250 million the day before the ground attack was launched against Iraq.

The New York Times of August 17, 1990 - 15 days after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait - reported US Secretary of State James Baker as saying this of Syria, "We have problems with their support of terrorism, but we share a common goal." As John Pilger points out, "The goal was the destruction of Syria's old foe, Iraq."

This farce shows that the leading Western powers do not hesitate to use any human tragedy for the purpose of political terrorism and blackmail. As the 1986 Berlin disco bombing incident and the subsequent Reagan bombing of Tripoli and Benghazi show, the imperialist predators and their terrorist hyenas and vultures are at work yet once again, with their "irrefutable" evidence against Libya.

On 14 November 1991 the United States and British governments indicted two Libyan nationals on murder charges arising from the bombing of Pan Am 103. They demanded that Libya hand over the two men - Abdel Baset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhima.

The next day Libya formally denied involvement in the bombing. The Libyan Foreign Ministry in a statement "categorically denies any Libyan involvement in the mentioned incident or any knowledge by the Libyan authorities of it."

It added: "We call on the United States and Britain to resort to the logic of law, wisdom and rationality by referring the issue to neutral international arbitration panels or the International Court of Justice." It said Libya reserved the right to defend itself before "just and neutral judicial authorities, the United Nations and the International Court."

Threat of Military Action

While the Libyan government was talking about peaceful international arbitration, the American and British governments were making threatening noises about possible military action against Libya.

A Reuter report of 15 November 1991 carried a statement by a British official that possible military action against Libya would be on the agenda when US and British leaders discussed what to do if Libya failed to hand over the two men charged with the Lockerbie bombing. The official said Prime Minister John Major and President George Bush would speak by telephone in the next few days "to review the situation."

Asked whether military action would be among options to be discussed, the official said "I'm sure it will be."

The same Reuter report tells us that in Washington, George Bush, the mass killer of civilians in Panama and Iraq, had told reporters: "This is very serious business that we're involved in." The report says that although Bush did not elaborate on what steps might be taken, his spokesman Marlin Fitzwater would not rule out a possible military strike.

As Professor Noam Chomsky points out in the January 1992 issue of Lies of Our Times (LOOT), a magazine published in New York, there was an orchestration of fingers pointing at Libya by most of the Western media. But he adds: "The reaction was not entirely uniform."

Chomsky explains: "In short, there was a spectrum of responses. At one extreme, we have those who take the government case to be proven on the grounds that it was proclaimed. At the other are the skeptics, leading proponents of international terrorism and Defenders of Jerusalem, who adopt Israel's position that its enemies have been 'let off the hook' and should be relentlessly pursued."

In summing up, Chomsky says: "In fact, Libya has been used as a punching bag for domestic purposes since mid-1981. As the effects of the Reagan-Bush assault against the population become more difficult to conceal, we can anticipate regular replays of the scenario of the past years: awesome enemy, miraculous triumph by heroic leader."

Prostituting the U.N.

Despite the many offers made by Libya that the dispute be referred to an independent international tribunal for arbitration, the United States and Britain flatly rejected all of them.

On 22 January 1992, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 731 urging Libya to cooperate with international probes into the bombings of the Pan Am 103 and a French UTA jet that killed 170 people over Niger in 1989.

Out of the blue, the case of the UTA jet bombing was injected into the dispute. By "international probes", it was meant that Libya must hand over her citizens for trial in the United States, Britain and France. Notice the perversity of the Orwellian use of language.

The United States, Britain and France, which sponsored Resolution 731 warned that if Libya refused to "co-operate", they reserved the right to ask the Security Council to impose an air and oil embargo on Libya.

This was diplomacy by intimidation. It was tantamount to a Mafia-like ultimatum for "co-operation". Moreover, this unprecedented move of the Security Council was at variance to the United Nations Charter with regard to a member's state's own judicial procedures.

When the United States and Britain demanded that Libya should hand over the two nationals accused of being involved in the Pan Am jet bombing, Libya quite rightly refused to do so. Libya has no extradition treaties with these two countries.

Even in cases where an extradition treaty exists between two countries, certain internationally agreed procedures have to be followed. N.A. Maryan Green, an expert in international law, has pointed out in the second edition of his book International Law of Peace (McDonald and Evans, 1982):

"A mere request for extradition is not sufficient: some evidence must generally be provided that the wanted person was guilty of the extraditable act.

"A warrant of arrest from the requesting state is always required as a formality. In democratic states, the person may not be extradited without authorisation by a judge after hearing in public and in the presence of the accused."

Although Libya refused to hand over the suspects, it had agreed to co-operate in all other respects, from the very start of the controversy in mid-November 1991. It suggested that the matter should go to international arbitration. The United States and Britain refused to co-operate.

After this, all the same, Libya appointed two magistrates to look into the case. The two magistrates had asked American, British and French investigators to provide them the evidence. Again, this request was turned down.

Libya also suggested that lawyers and journalists could attend the hearings in Libya. There seemed to be no takers. Why?

Why did the Americans, British and French refuse to go for international arbitration as provided for under the U.N. Charter? Have they no confidence in international arbitration, including that at the World Court? Was it because of this that the United States refused in 1986 to respect the World Court judgement against it in a case filed by Nicaragua?

The Americans, British and French say that they have "proof" that Libyan nationals were responsible for the bombings of the two planes. If that were so, why are they so reluctant to furnish such "proof" to the appointed Libyan magistrates?

And why is Libya so sceptical of such word-of-mouth "proof"? Well, not without good reason, when we remember the case of the bombing of the Berlin disco. In that case, as we have already seen, "proof", "hard evidence" and "irrefutable evidence" of Libyan involvement were utterly and criminally bogus. And the United States government simply hushed up the facts! So much for truth and law and order.

Writing in the 24 November 1991 issue of The Observer of London, Adrian Hamilton says: "It may not be the most popular thing to say, but the threats being made against Libya over the Lockerbie bombing are an outrageous and unacceptable form of international bullying." He added: "The assault on Libya is all too conveniently timed to let Iran and Syria off the hook and speed the release of hostages."

Since when has the Security Council been so concerned about terrorism against civilian aircraft? When a Libyan civilian plane with 111 passengers was shot down by the Israelis over the Sinai on 21 February 1973, killing everyone on board, did the Security Council meet to pass a resolution calling on the Israelis to hand over the culprits to Libya?

Did the Security Council do the same with regard to an Italian civilian plane with 81 passengers shot down on 27 June 1981 over Costa Rica?

Did it do the same with the shooting down of an Iranian civilian aircraft (Iran Air flight 655) with 290 passengers by the U.S. Vincennes, a US cruiser on patrol in the Persian Gulf on 3 July 1988? After all, as William Lutz has pointed out in his book DOUBLE-SPEAK (Harper & Row, 1989), the "mistake" claimed by the Americans were not really mistakes....

Contempt of Court

In March 1992 Libya asked the International Court of Justice (World Court) to rule on questions of interpretation and application of the 1971 Montreal Convention arising from the aerial incident at Lockerbie. Libya also requested the Court for a restraining order against the United States and Britain to use force against her.

The World Court begun hearings on the case on 26 March, 1992 at the Hague in the Netherlands. However, it was shocking that the United States and Britain were still making threats and issuing ultimatums against Libya even after the hearings had begun at the World Court.

This kind of behaviour was indecent, uncivilised and highly irresponsible. It was an utter contempt of the dignity and integrity of the World Court on the part of the United States and Britain. This sort of unruly behaviour was indeed most intolerable and unacceptable. One silly argument by the two countries was that referring the case to the World Court would take time.

Why were the United States and Britain so disrespectful of the World Court? As Professor Alfred Rubin of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in the United States has pointed out, "... if the charge (against Libya) is serious, there is everything to gain and nothing to lose by presenting the case to the International Court of Justice as Libya proposes."

In their utter contempt of the World Court, the American and British and French governments were not going to wait for its findings. On 31 March, 1992, they got the Security Council to vote for Resolution 748 to impose trade sanctions, flight sanctions and an arms embargo on Libya for failing to surrender six suspects in the bombings of Pan Am 103 and a French UTA jetliner.

The vote of the 15-member Council was 10 in favour, none opposed, and five abstentions: China, Cape Verde, India, Morocco and Zimbabwe. The countries that abstained argued that sanctions should be a last resort, that diplomacy should be given more time, and that action should await a ruling by the World Court.

According to an AP report, the sanctions carried the threat of the use of force. The sanctions are legally binding and can be enforced by military action because the resolution invokes Chapter 7 of the UN Charter which authorises the use of force.

Libyan Ambassador Ali Elhouderi argued before the vote that sanctions would pave the way for another air strike on Libya.

On April 5, the US government advised Americans in Libya to leave immediately. An estimated 500 to 1,000 Americans were believed to be working in Libya, mainly in the oil industry. Later the American government was also instigating that the thousands of Thai workers in Libya should leave that country!

Resolution 748 Illegal

By virtue of the fact that the World Court at the Hague had begun hearings on the case on March 26, the matter had become sub-judice since then.

The Security council violated this sub-judice rule, a very fundamental legal principle in all civilised countries which uphold the rule of law, when it passed Resolution 748 four days later. By doing so, the Security Council was guilty of contempt of court.

Moreover, Resolution 748 is also invalid, illegal and null and void on the following ground:

* Paragraph three of article 27 of the UN Charter states that "decisions of the Security Council on all other matters (except procedural matters) shall be made by an affirmative vote of nine members including the concurring votes of the permanent members". By virtue of the fact that China, a permanent member, was present in the Security Council and abstained in the voting, there was no unanimity of vote among the five permanent members.

* By virtue of article 33 of Chapter VI of the UN Charter, the United States, Britain and France are "parties to any dispute" with Libya seeking a solution by "judicial settlement" at the World Court. Those three countries should have abstained voting under paragraph three of article 27. The fact that they did not had rendered Resolution 748 null and void.

* The status and position of Russia taking the place of the former Soviet Union as a permanent member of the Security Council had yet to be ratified by the republics of the former Soviet Union and at the UN General Assembly, thus nullifying its vote.

Hence, it is outrageous and lunatic of the Security Council to try and impose sanctions and ultimatums on Libya when it has itself blatantly violated the UN Charter.

As Anthony Lewis, a senior writer of the New York Times, had written in the February 10, 1992 issue of the International Herald Tribune, "Egyptian lawyers point out, as do international lawyers in the West, there is no basis in international law for the demand that Libya turn over citizens suspected of crimes to another country. The authority for such a demand must rest on an extradition treaty, and Libya has none with the United States or Britain."

On 14 April 1992, the World Court rejected Libya's request for a restraining order against the United States and Britain. The Court said it did not find there was any urgency in the case such as a proven threat to use force against Libya, which might have justified a restraining order. However, it did not rule on the interpretation of the Montreal Convention.

The next day the UN Security Council's sanctions against Libya went into effect. Was someone even orchestrating the timing of events?

On the same day that the World Court announced its ruling, Malta agreed to accept the two Libyans accused of bombing Pan Am 103. This was announced by Esmat Abdel Maguid, the Secretary General of the Arab League. Earlier offers by Libya to send the two persons to a third country had been rejected by the United States and Britain.

Malta's decision was in response to a Libyan offer sent to the UN by the Arab League. The immediate response of the United States and Britain was that they did not believe the offer would be enough to avert the imposition of sanctions on Libya. In other words, they had rejected it.

Meanwhile, US Secretary of State James Baker said he was delighted by the World Court's ruling. Of course this hypocrite and his government did not hesitate to reject the World Court decision against the United States in 1986 arising from a case filed in by Nicaragua.

As Professor Noam Chomsky had put it succinctly, "The brazen arrogance of the powerful passes far beyond the imagination of ordinary mortals."

TIME Magazine Exposes

TIME magazine carried a special cover story on the Lockerbie affair on April 27, 1992. Titled "The Untold Story of Pan Am 103", the story was written by Roy Rowan, who had been a writer, foreign correspondent and editor for 44 years.

In his five-month investigation of the case, Rowan visited Scandinavia, Germany, England, California and Washington, where he conducted more than 200 interviews and examined thousands of documents, including confidential memos from former US and foreign intelligence agents.

In his 9-page report, Rowan concludes that provocative evidence suggests that a Syrian drug dealer may have helped to plant the bomb - and that the real targets were intelligence agents working for the CIA.

The TIME report says that the US Justice Department's decision to blame the bombing on the two Libyans has "triggered an outcry from the victims' families, who claimed that pointing the finger at Libya was a political ploy designed to reward Syria for siding with the US in the gulf war and to help with the release of the hostages." It adds: "Even Vincent Cannistraro, former head of the CIA's investigation of the bombing, told the New York Times it was 'outrageous' to pin the whole thing on Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi."

The TIME investigation has disclosed evidence that raises new questions about the case. Among the discoveries:

* According to an FBI field report from Germany, the suitcase originating in Malta that supposedly contained the bomb may not have been transferred to Pan Am Flight 103 in Frankfurt, as charged in the indictment of the two Libyans. Instead, the bomb-laden bag may have been substituted in Frankfurt for an innocent piece of luggage.

* The rogue bag may have been placed on board the plane by Jibril's group with the help of Monzer Al-Kassar, a Syrian drug dealer who was cooperating with the US's Drug Enforcement Administration in a drug sting operation. Al-Kassar thus may have been playing both sides of the fence.

* Jibril and his group may have targeted that flight because on board was an intelligence team led by Charles McKee, whose job was to find and rescue the hostages.

Significantly, TIME magazine had also interviewed Beulah McKee, the 75-year-old mother of Charles McKee, at her home in Trafford, Pennsylvania. Mrs McKee said: "For three years, I've had a feeling that if Chuck hadn't been on that plane, it wouldn't have been bombed. I know that's not what our President wants me to say."

According to TIME, "... deep inside, Mrs McKee suspects it was a government action gone horribly awry that indirectly led to her only son's death."

'Chuck' Charles McKee's mother said: "I've never been satisfied at all by what the people in Washington told me." She added: "The governments secrecy can't close off my mind." Mrs McKee also said that twice she called and questioned Susan, the widow of Gannon, who died in the crash with Charles McKee. Gannon, like Susan's father Tom Twetten, worked for the CIA. "The last time, I was accused of opening my mouth too much," said Mrs. McKee.

Meanwhile, in an interview conducted by an Italian cable television network for Channel Two in New York, the Editor of TIME magazine confirmed the authenticity of the information and evidence which his magazine obtained and published. He said: "We are sure of the authenticity of the report published by our magazine relating to the implication of other parties in this incident." He said that the evidence furnished by the American administration accusing Libya was unconvincing and consisted merely of a small fragment of a timing device and another small piece of fabric which was said to be from the same suitcase which contained the bomb.

The Editor said he noted that the American government had tried to refute TIME's information which would absolve Libya of any responsibility. In response to a question posed by the Italian cable television network asking that when the authenticity of the information had been verified, would the harsh measures imposed on Libya be lifted, the Editor said that he didn't believe that would happen, even if the innocence of the two Libyans accused was proven. He also added that the two Libyans had nothing to do with the Lockerbie incident.