New Lockerbie probe
October 25, 2009
A report in the Sunday Telegraph newspaper said that families of British victims of the attack have been told that a further review was underway.
The report cites an e-mail from state prosecutors to victims' families, saying several potential lines of inquiry were being considered and that efforts were being made to obtain fresh evidence.
The news comes just over two months after convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi was freed from a Scottish jail on compassionate grounds.
The former Libyan agent is the only person convicted of the murder of 270 people in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie on December 21, 1988.
Tensions arose between Tripoli, London, Edinburgh and Washington following the release of Megrahi, a terminal prostate cancer sufferer.
The move also shocked and angered the families of the 189 US nationals who died in the bombing.
The Crown Office in Scotland, the prosecuting authority, has e-mailed relatives informing them of the new investigation situation following Megrahi's dropped appeal, release and return to Libya, the Sunday Telegraph said.
Quest for new evidence
The newspaper quoted Scottish public prosecutor Lindsey Miller, who was involved in preparing evidence for Megrahi's trial, as saying proactive efforts were continuing to try to obtain new information and evidence in the case.
"Throughout the investigation we have, at various times, taken stock of the evidence as a whole with a view to identifying further lines of inquiry that can be pursued,” Miller wrote.
"Now that the appeal proceedings are at an end a further review of the case is underway and several potential lines of inquiry, both through a 'desktop' (paper) exercise and consultation with forensic science colleagues are being considered.”
Miller went on to add: "Please be assured that this is not simply paying lip service to the idea of an 'open case'."
'No re-opening of case against Megrahi'
However, a Crown Office spokesman dismissed the possibility of re-opening the case against Megrahi himself, saying the open case concerns only the involvement of others with Megrahi in the murder of 270 people.
The development comes as a relatives' group called UK Families Flight 103 delivered a letter to Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Downing Street office asking him to instigate a full independent inquiry into the bombing.
But a Downing Street spokesman said: "The Scottish courts have made a decision in the case – and we still have a convicted individual. It is our belief that nothing can be gained from a public inquiry."
rb/AFP
Editor: Kyle James