🔗 Share this article

US legal authorities have asserted that a Libyan suspect willingly admitted to participating in operations against US citizens, including the 1988's Pan Am Flight 103 attack and an aborted conspiracy to target a American government official using a booby-trapped overcoat.

Confession Information

Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir al-Marimi is said to have acknowledged his participation in the murder of 270 victims when the aircraft was exploded over the Scottish community of Lockerbie, during interrogation in a Libya's prison in the year 2012.

Referred to as the defendant, the senior individual has stated that several disguised individuals compelled him to provide the admission after menacing him and his loved ones.

His legal representatives are working to block it from being used as testimony in his legal proceedings in Washington in 2025.

Judicial Dispute

In response, lawyers from the federal prosecutors have declared they can establish in legal proceedings that the statement was "willing, reliable and correct."

The presence of Mas'ud's alleged statement was originally made public in 2020, when the US announced it was accusing him with building and preparing the bomb used on the aircraft.

Defendant's Claims

The family man is charged of being a former official in Libya's secret service and has been in US confinement since recent years.

He has stated innocent to the allegations and is due to face trial at the US court for the District of Columbia in the coming months.

Mas'ud's lawyers are attempting to stop the court from being informed about the confession and have submitted a petition asking for it to be withheld.

They contend it was obtained under coercion following the overthrow which toppled the former dictator in 2011.

Purported Intimidation

They claim former members of the leader's regime were being singled out with unlawful deaths, abductions and mistreatment when the suspect was seized from his home by armed individuals the following year.

He was taken to an unregistered holding location where fellow detainees were purportedly assaulted and mistreated and was alone in a small room when several hooded men presented him a single sheet of material.

His attorneys stated its handwritten information started with an order that he was to acknowledge to the Lockerbie incident and another terrorist incident.

Significant Extremist Events

The defendant states he was ordered to memorise what it said about the events and repeat it when he was interviewed by someone else the subsequent morning.

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

In their answer to the defendant's motion, attorneys from the US Department of Justice have said the court was being asked to exclude "very pertinent proof" of Mas'ud's responsibility in "several major extremist events against US citizens."

Authorities Rebuttals

They assert the defendant's account of occurrences is unconvincing and inaccurate, and assert that the details of the confession can be verified by credible independent testimony gathered over numerous years.

The government attorneys claim the suspect and fellow former officials of the former leader's intelligence service were kept in a secret holding center managed by a militia when they were questioned by an seasoned Libyan investigator.

They assert that in the chaos of the post-revolution time, the location was "the safest place" for Mas'ud and the fellow personnel, accounting for the conflict and resistance attitude prevailing at the period.

Investigation Details

Per to the police officer who interviewed Mas'ud, the center was "properly managed", the prisoners were not restrained and there were no indications of torture or pressure.

The investigator has stated that over multiple sessions, a confident and fit defendant explained his role in the explosions of Pan Am 103.

The federal authorities has also asserted he had admitted building a bomb which went off in a West Berlin club in 1986, claiming the lives of multiple persons, encompassing two American military personnel, and harming numerous more.

Additional Accusations

He is also said to have recounted his involvement in an conspiracy on the lives of an anonymous American Secretary of State at a official ceremony in the Asian country.

The suspect is alleged to have explained that someone accompanying the US figure was wearing a rigged coat.

It was the suspect's assignment to trigger the bomb but he chose not to do so after discovering that the man bearing the garment did not realize he was on a deadly operation.

He opted "not to push the device" even though his superior in the intelligence service being alongside at the moment and questioning what was {going on|happening|occurring