🔗 Share this article

US legal authorities have asserted that a Libyan national suspect voluntarily admitted to taking part in attacks against American targets, comprising the 1988's Lockerbie incident and an unsuccessful plot to kill a American public figure using a rigged coat.

Statement Information

Abu Agila Mas'ud Kheir al-Marimi is alleged to have acknowledged his role in the killing of 270 victims when Pan Am 103 was brought down over the Scotland's town of Lockerbie, during questioning in a Libyan prison in the year 2012.

Referred to as the defendant, the elderly man has asserted that several hooded persons forced him to make the admission after menacing him and his family.

His lawyers are attempting to stop it from being employed as testimony in his court case in Washington next year.

Courtroom Dispute

In answer, attorneys from the federal prosecutors have declared they can prove in court that the confession was "voluntary, trustworthy and truthful."

The existence of the defendant's purported admission was initially disclosed in the year 2020, when the US declared it was indicting him with constructing and preparing the explosive device employed on Pan Am 103.

Legal Team Claims

The father-of-six is alleged of being a former official in Libya's intelligence agency and has been in American custody since 2022.

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

The defendant's legal team are attempting to prevent the trial from hearing about the statement and have submitted a petition asking for it to be excluded.

They argue it was secured under coercion following the uprising which removed Colonel Gaddafi in 2011.

Purported Coercion

They assert former officials of the leader's regime were being victimized with wrongful murders, kidnappings and mistreatment when Mas'ud was seized from his home by hostile persons the next period.

He was transported to an unregistered prison facility where other inmates were purportedly beaten and mistreated and was alone in a cramped space when several hooded persons presented him a solitary document of paper.

His lawyers said its manually written information started with an instruction that he was to acknowledge to the Lockerbie attack and another terrorist incident.

Major Terrorist Incidents

The suspect states he was told to remember what it indicated about the events and restate it when he was interviewed by another person the next day.

Being concerned for his well-being and that of his children, he claimed he felt he had no choice but to acquiesce.

In their response to the defense's request, attorneys from the American justice department have said the judge was being petitioned to exclude "extremely significant proof" of the suspect's responsibility in "multiple significant extremist incidents against US citizens."

Prosecution Rebuttals

They say the suspect's version of occurrences is implausible and untrue, and argue that the contents of the admission can be corroborated by credible external evidence gathered over numerous periods.

The government attorneys say the defendant and other ex- personnel of Gaddafi's secret service were held in a secret holding center managed 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 period, the center was "the most secure place" for Mas'ud and the other agents, given the conflict and opposition attitude prevailing at the moment.

Interrogation Particulars

Based to the investigator who interviewed the suspect, the center was "well run", the detainees were not bound and there were no signs of abuse or pressure.

The investigator has stated that over two days, a composed and fit defendant detailed his involvement in the bombings of Pan Am 103.

The FBI has also claimed he had acknowledged creating a bomb which went off in a German venue in the mid-1980s, killing several individuals, encompassing two US soldiers, and harming many additional.

Further Claims

He is also alleged to have described his participation in an plot on the lives of an anonymous American foreign minister at a official ceremony in Pakistan.

Mas'ud is reported to have stated that an individual accompanying the American official was bearing a explosive-laden coat.

It was Mas'ud's assignment to detonate the device but he chose not to proceed after learning that the individual bearing the coat did not know he was on a deadly operation.

He opted "not to push the button" even though his superior in the secret service being present at the time and inquiring what was {going on|happening|occurring