CNN
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The bombing of Pan Am Airlines Flight 103 may have taken place more than 30 years ago, but the appearance of alleged bomb maker Abu Aguila Mohammad Masoud Kier al-Malimi in a US court on Monday , a new wave of interest in attacks arose.
Here’s what you need to know about the worst terrorist attacks in the UK.
On December 21, 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 exploded at 31,000 feet above Lockerby, Scotland, 38 minutes after taking off from London.
259 people on board a Boeing 747 bound for New York died, and 11 died on the ground.
According to a 2020 affidavit by a special agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), witnesses in Lockerbie and the surrounding area said part of the aircraft “falled out of the sky and part of it was engulfed in flames. It appeared to be there,” he reported. Shared by the U.S. Department of Justice.
“As debris from the aircraft struck the ground, some of them exploded. It left a crater about 40 feet deep where it used to be,” the agent said in an affidavit.
Investigators from the United States and the United Kingdom subsequently found fragments of circuit boards and timers, and determined that the cause of the explosion was the bomb, rather than a mechanical failure.
Over three years, investigators in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and other countries have questioned more than 15,000 people and collected thousands of evidence in over 30 countries.
Authorities accused Libyan citizens Abdelbeset Ali Mohamed Al-Megrahi and Al-Amin Khalifa Fima of building the bomb. The bomb was made of a Semtex plastic explosive, hidden in a Toshiba cassette recorder, hidden in a Samsonite suitcase, and slipped onto an Air Malta plane from Malta to Frankfurt, Germany.
The unaccompanied bag is believed to have been taken on a Pan Am flight to London and then on Flight 103.
The CIA and FBI said the suspect hired by Libyan Arab Airlines in Malta was also a Libyan intelligence officer.
Libya’s leader at the time, Moammar Gaddafi, denied responsibility for the attack.
However, after Libya was initially sanctioned by the United Nations for refusing to extradite the suspects to trial, it was agreed that the two would be prosecuted in a neutral location in the Netherlands.
In 2002, the suspect was extradited to the United Nations.
The following year, Libya agreed to pay $2.7 billion in reparations to the families of those killed, paving the way for the lifting of UN sanctions against the country.
The trial of Megrahi and Fhimah began on May 3, 2000 and ended on January 31, 2001. Megrahi was eventually found guilty and jailed for a minimum of 27 years. Fhimah was acquitted.
In October 2008, Megrahi was announced to be suffering from terminal cancer and in August 2009 he was released from prison in Scotland for compassionate reasons.
After his release, Megalahi returned to Libya and was met with a jubilant welcome. He died on May 20, 2012.
In October 2015, Scottish authorities announced that two more Libyans had been identified as suspects in the bombing.
Five years later, on December 21, 2020, U.S. Attorney General William Barr announced criminal charges against former Libyan intelligence officer Abu Aguila Mohammad Massoud Kier al-Malimi in connection with the Lockerbie attack.
The case apparently fell apart after Masoud was arrested by Libyan authorities in another case. A 2012 Libyan interrogation report claiming he admitted to building the Lockerbie bomb reached U.S. officials, and in 2020 the FBI traveled to Tunisia to interview former Libyan officials who received Massoud’s statements. .
Mas’ud was charged with passing prepared explosives to his suitcase, which was later brought on board. At the time, he was detained in Libya.
On Sunday, the U.S. Department of Justice said Massoud is in custody in the United States.
