American Prosecutors Allege Libyan Voluntarily Admitted to Pan Am Flight 103 Terrorist Incident

Lockerbie bombing aftermath
The Pan Am Flight 103 incident resulted in the deaths of 270 victims in the late 1980s

US prosecutors have stated that a Libyan national individual willingly admitted to being involved in terrorist acts targeting US citizens, including the 1988 Lockerbie bombing and an aborted plot to assassinate a US government official using a explosive-laden coat.

Statement Details

Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir al-Marimi is reported to have admitted his role in the deaths of 270 individuals when Pan Am 103 was destroyed over the Scottish town of the region, during questioning in a Libyan detention facility in the year 2012.

Identified as Mas'ud, the senior individual has stated that multiple hooded individuals forced him to make the admission after menacing him and his loved ones.

His attorneys are trying to stop it from being employed as evidence in his court case in Washington in the coming year.

Courtroom Battle

In answer, legal counsel from the federal prosecutors have declared they can prove in legal proceedings that the statement was "willing, reliable and correct."

The presence of the suspect's alleged statement was first made public in the year 2020, when the US declared it was accusing him with building and preparing the bomb employed on Pan Am 103.

Defense Assertions

The defendant is accused of being a former official in Libyan secret service and has been in US detention since 2022.

He has pleaded innocent to the accusations and is scheduled to stand trial at the US court for the Washington DC in spring.

Mas'ud's attorneys are trying to block the jury from hearing about the confession and have filed a petition asking for it to be excluded.

They argue it was obtained under duress following the revolution which removed Colonel Gaddafi in 2011.

Claimed Intimidation

They say former personnel of the dictator's administration were being singled out with wrongful murders, kidnappings and abuse when Mas'ud was taken from his dwelling by armed individuals the next period.

He was moved to an informal holding location where other inmates were allegedly abused and harmed and was isolated in a small room when three disguised men presented him a solitary page of documentation.

His attorneys said its handwritten information began with an order that he was to acknowledge to the Lockerbie bombing and an additional violent act.

Major Terrorist Attacks

Mas'ud states he was told to memorise what it said about the occurrences and recite it when he was questioned by someone else the following morning.

Fearing for his well-being and that of his offspring, he stated he felt he had no option but to obey.

In their reply to the defense's request, lawyers from the federal prosecutors have declared the tribunal was being requested to exclude "extremely pertinent evidence" of the defendant's responsibility in "several significant terrorist incidents directed at Americans."

Prosecution Counterarguments

They claim the defendant's version of events is unbelievable and false, and argue that the information of the admission can be verified by credible external testimony assembled over numerous periods.

The legal authorities claim Mas'ud and additional ex- personnel of the former leader's secret service were detained in a secret holding center run by a armed group when they were questioned by an knowledgeable Libya's law enforcement official.

They assert that in the turmoil of the post-revolution time, the center was "the protected environment" for the suspect and the additional operatives, considering the conflict and resistance attitude widespread at the period.

Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir Al-Marimi in custody
Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir Al-Marimi has been in detention since late 2022

Interrogation Information

Per to the investigator who interviewed the suspect, the center was "properly managed", the detainees were not bound and there were no indications of coercion or pressure.

The investigator has said that over 48 hours, a self-assured and healthy Mas'ud explained his role in the attacks of Flight 103.

The federal authorities has also claimed he had confessed constructing a device which exploded in a German club in the mid-1980s, claiming the lives of several people, including two US soldiers, and wounding numerous more.

Other Allegations

He is also said to have detailed his participation in an conspiracy on the life of an unidentified US diplomatic official at a official ceremony in Pakistan.

The suspect is reported to have described that someone travelling the US figure was carrying a booby-trapped coat.

It was Mas'ud's task to detonate the device but he chose not to act after learning that the man wearing the coat did not understand he was on a suicide mission.

He chose "not to trigger the device" although his supervisor in the intelligence service being with him at the period and questioning what was {going on|happening|occurring

Jacqueline Burnett
Jacqueline Burnett

Fintech enthusiast and blockchain expert with a passion for secure digital innovations.