Scottish investigator says 'many more suspects' in Lockerbie case

Oct 26, 2009, 8:50 GMT

London - British investigators were initially looking for eight further potential suspects in connection with the 1988 Lockerbie bombing for which only one man - Libyan Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, has been convicted, according to press reports Monday.

The revelation was made Monday by Stuart Henderson, a former detective chief superintendent with Lothian and Borders Police in Scotland who led the Lockerbie Incident Control Centre from 1988 until 1992.

Henderson told the Scotsman newspaper that a list of people in Libya was identified by police investigating the bombing, but they were never interviewed.

The news comes after new lines of inquiry are being considered by the Scottish authorities in the ongoing investigation into the atrocity in which 270 people died.

Al-Megrahi, a former Libyan agent sentenced to life for the attack in 2001, was freed from jail in Scotland on health grounds in August. He has consistently said he is innocent, but dropped an appeal against his sentence before his release.

'We submitted eight other names of people that we wished to interview that were strong suspects. Unfortunately, we never got that opportunity,' Henderson told the Scotsman.

'I am delighted they are making moves to see if there is anything further, because no matter what anybody says, we did not ever say it was just Megrahi we were after. We never said that. We were after his bosses,' said Henderson.

It was reported that the 'high level suspects' were all male and had never been ruled out of the investigation into the explosion onboard Pan Am Flight 103 on December 21, 1988. The majority were US citizens.