Word: megrahi
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...responsibility for Lockerbie in 2003 was a condition of the U.N. lifting sanctions and the U.S. removing Libya from its list of states sponsoring terrorism. The North African state is now a strategic partner for the U.S. in its anti-terrorism efforts and as a major oil producer. If Megrahi is acquitted, Libya and the U.S. will both likely tread carefully. Neither seems to have much to gain from upsetting their current relationship, but an exoneration of Megrahi would be a sign to the world that, perhaps, Libya has been unjustly penalized. Gaddafi's son claims that, for now, Libya...
...bound for New York City from London, the only man ever convicted of the attack may be headed back to court for an appeal. On Thursday, the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) announced that it referred the case of former Libyan intelligence officer Abdel Basset Ali Al-Megrahi back to the country's High Court system. The SCCRC said Megrahi, currently serving a 27-year minimum sentence, is entitled to a new appeal because he may have suffered a miscarriage of justice in 2001 when he was convicted by a panel of three Scottish judges for the 270 murders...
...nations depended on that country turning over its Lockerbie suspects in 1999, and then, after the trial, accepting responsibility and compensating the victims' families, a settlement hammered out in 2002 and 2003. Libya agreed to pay out $2.7 billion for the bombing. But only one of the Libyans, Megrahi, was convicted - a verdict several parties have disputed, including a U.N.-appointed observer who complained of a "political aura" at the initial trial...
...criticism, in essence, centers on the identification of Megrahi by a Maltese shopkeeper, and whether the date of their alleged meeting is correct. According to the Commission, a combination of evidence not available at the trial and not adequately considered at the trial, sheds doubt on a cornerstone of the prosecution case: that Megrahi was in all the right places to have prepared the suitcase that carried the explosive device. The Edinburgh High Court will now review Megrahi's case - though it may take months, according to a High Court spokeswoman, to find the five judges needed to hear...
...SYRIA AND IRAN: The decision also threatens the West's distinctly less comfortable relationship with Syria and Iran. Shedding doubt on Megrahi's guilt automatically shifts public attention back to the original Lockerbie suspects: the Syrian-based Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC). Before investigators uncovered a Libyan connection, they seriously considered that PFLP-GC members carried out the attack at the behest of Iran. Iran had vowed revenge for the 1988 U.S. downing of an Iran Air flight and, according to statements from a now-retired CIA agent that were submitted by the defense...