ACCESSION
NUMBER:361028
FILE ID:TXT103
DATE:09/19/94
TITLE:BRINGING LIBYAN TERRORISTS TO JUSTICE (09/19/94)
TEXT:*94091903.TXT
BRINGING LIBYAN TERRORISTS TO JUSTICE
(VOA Editorial) (360)
(Following is an editorial, broadcast by the Voice of America September 19,
reflecting the views of the U.S. government.)
September 19, 1989. A French passenger plane, UTA flight 772, departs
Ndjamena airport in Chad for Paris. Fifty minutes later, a bomb blows the
plane apart 30,000 feet above the mountains of southeastern Niger.
Scattered across the landscape are the bodies -- some still strapped to
their seats -- of 171 men, women, and children. Among them are seven
Americans, including Bonnie Pugh, the wife of the U.S. ambassador to Chad.
French authorities have charged four Libyan officials with responsibility
for this savage act of international terrorism. On October 30, 1991, a
French magistrate issued arrest warrants for Abdallah Sanussi, a relative
of Libyan dictator Moammar Qadhafi and second-in-command of the regime's
intelligence service; Nayil Ibrahim, a subordinate of Sanussi; Abbas
Musbah, a Libyan intelligence operative in Brazzaville, Congo; and Abd
Al-Azragh, first secretary of the Libyan People's Bureau in Brazzaville.
Al-Azragh is charged with recruiting three Congolese to plant the suitcase
bomb that destroyed UTA flight 772.
Libyan agents are also charged with the December 1988 bombing of Pan
American flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, which took the lives of 270
people. In November 1991, U.S. and British authorities issued warrants for
the arrest of Abdel Al-Megrahi, a senior Libyan intelligence officer, and
Lamem Fhimah, former manager of the Libyan airlines office in Malta.
The U.N. Security Council passed Resolution 731 in January 1992, supporting
U.S., British, and French demands concerning the bombings. Libya is
required to pay compensation for the murders; deliver the Pan Am 103
1uspects for trial in the United States or Britain; cooperate with France
in the UTA investigation; and cease all support for international
terrorism.
In response to the Qadhafi regime's refusal to comply with its resolutions,
the United Nations imposed sanctions on Libya. The United States urges all
nations to cooperate in enforcing those sanctions. Libya's ruler can end
the sanctions at any time -- by heeding the U.N. Security Council's
resolutions and handing over the accused terrorists for trial.
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