🔗 Share this article

US prosecutors have stated that a Libyan national suspect freely confessed to being involved in attacks against US citizens, encompassing the 1988 Pan Am Flight 103 bombing and an aborted attempt to target a American politician using a explosive-laden coat.

Statement Information

Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir al-Marimi is alleged to have confessed his role in the murder of 270 victims when Flight 103 was destroyed over the Scotland's area of the region, during questioning in a Libyan prison in the year 2012.

Identified as the suspect, the senior individual has asserted that multiple hooded individuals pressured him to make the admission after threatening him and his loved ones.

His attorneys are working to prevent it from being employed as proof in his legal proceedings in DC next year.

Courtroom Battle

In response, lawyers from the American justice department have said they can prove in legal proceedings that the statement was "voluntary, trustworthy and accurate."

The presence of Mas'ud's claimed admission was originally disclosed in the year 2020, when the United States stated it was indicting him with building and activating the bomb utilized on the aircraft.

Defendant's Claims

The defendant is accused of being a ex- colonel in Libyan intelligence service and has been in American confinement since 2022.

He has stated innocent to the accusations and is expected to stand trial at the federal court for the the capital in spring.

The defendant's lawyers are trying to stop the jury from hearing about the statement and have filed a petition asking for it to be suppressed.

They argue it was obtained under duress following the revolution which overthrew the former dictator in 2011.

Claimed Coercion

They claim ex- personnel of the ruler's government were being victimized with unlawful murders, abductions and mistreatment when the suspect was seized from his home by weapon-carrying men the following year.

He was taken to an informal holding location where fellow prisoners were reportedly abused and abused and was isolated in a small cell when multiple masked individuals handed him a single sheet of paper.

His lawyers claimed its handwritten details began with an instruction that he was to acknowledge to the Lockerbie bombing and another violent act.

Major Terrorist Events

The defendant asserts he was told to learn what it said about the occurrences and restate it when he was questioned by someone else the next day.

Fearing for his security and that of his offspring, he said he thought he had no option but to acquiesce.

In their response to the legal team's request, legal counsel from the US Department of Justice have said the court was being petitioned to suppress "highly relevant evidence" of the defendant's culpability in "multiple substantial terrorist incidents against American people."

Government Responses

They say the suspect's account of events is unbelievable and inaccurate, and contend that the details of the admission can be supported by credible separate testimony gathered over many periods.

The government attorneys claim the suspect and other ex- members of the dictator's intelligence service were held in a covert holding center operated by a militia when they were interviewed by an experienced Libya's police officer.

They assert that in the turmoil of the aftermath era, the center was "the safest location" for the suspect and the fellow operatives, accounting for the hostility and opposition sentiment prevailing at the moment.

Interrogation Particulars

According to the law enforcement official who interviewed Mas'ud, the center was "properly managed", the detainees were not restrained and there were no signs of torture or intimidation.

The official has stated that over two days, a composed and well suspect detailed his involvement in the bombings of Pan Am 103.

The FBI has also asserted he had admitted constructing a device which detonated in a West Berlin club in 1986, claiming the lives of several people, including two American soldiers, and wounding numerous additional.

Additional Accusations

He is also reported to have detailed his role in an plot on the safety of an unidentified American diplomatic official at a state funeral in the Asian country.

The defendant is said to have described that someone travelling the American official was wearing a rigged coat.

It was the suspect's mission to detonate the explosive but he decided not to do so after learning that the individual carrying the garment did not understand he was on a fatal assignment.

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