Families Tell
It Like It Is

7/2/99

If the families are right, Gadhafi was behind the bombing.

If they are right, Dollar Bill is deliberately
obstructing justice by not calling for his arrest.

That would make him a co-conspirator.

Somehow AP failed to note this obvious fact.

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Pan Am Families To Attend Trial

By BARRY SCHWEID AP Diplomatic Writer

WASHINGTON (AP)

Families of victims of the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am jumbo jet will be sent
to the Netherlands to attend the trial of two Libyans accused of the crime.
Fines collected from American criminals will pay their way.

Also, the Justice Department is setting up a World Wide Web site
to help the families keep track of developments before the trial,
which may not start before next February, and Scottish prosecutors
are being invited to brief the families at a Washington hotel next month.

Travel and other expenses will be covered by a U.S. fund made
up of fines collected from convicted Americans, Kathryn Turman,
of the Justice Department's office for victims of crime, said Friday.

Susan Cohen, mother of Theodora Cohen, who died in the bombing, said
``the fact that the government is finally - after years of
treating the families badly - providing information is fine.''

But Cohen, in a telephone interview from her home in
Cape May Court House, N.J., alleged that the plan
involves a U.S. government public relations effort to win
the families' approval of a trial she denounced as ``a farce.''

``It was a political deal not to go after
Gadhafi, who ordered the murders,''
she said.

The two Libyans, Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah,
are being tried under Scottish law in The Hague on charges of planting a
suitcase bomb that blew up Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland,
and killed 270 people, including 189 Americans.

The United Nations responded to surrender of the two Libyans
last April by suspending sanctions against Libya.

The Clinton administration hailed the hand-over as a victory against terrorism.
But the United States maintained its own sanctions, including
a ban on American travel to Libya or doing business there.

Today, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he
could not determine whether Libya had met U.N.
demands for sanctions to be lifted permanently.

Security Council resolutions require Libya to cooperate
with the prosecution and to pay compensation to the families
of the victims of the bombing if the two men are convicted.

Annan's report will be taken by the U.N. Security Council next week.
There, the United States has said it would block any attempt to lift sanctions permanently.

State Department spokesman James Foley said Annan's report
made clear that Libya has not complied with U.N. requirements
to end and renounce support for terrorism, pay appropriate compensation,
cooperate with the Pan Am investigation and trial and
acknowledge responsibility for the actions of Libyan officials.

``The sanctions which are now suspended cannot be
lifted on the basis of assurances, and we're looking
for Libyan actions in the areas that I described,''
Foley said.

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Perhaps AP will file a FOIA request for all U.S. govt. documents
that concern possible Gadhafi orders of the attacks?!?!
(Yeah, right. Just as soon as they report on the assault rifle scandal.)

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