Document:Targeting of Bernt Carlsson on Pan Am Flight 103
| Ian Ferguson: "In the early stages of the Lockerbie investigation, Bernt Carlsson's Presikhaaf suitcase was seen as the more likely bomb case. Police sources at the time said that this case was cleared of being the suspect case on November 23rd 1989." |
Letter by Patrick Haseldine to Iain Livingstone dated 17 February 2023Subjects: Bernt Carlsson, Pan Am Flight 103, Mark Rowley, Chris Nicholson
Source: Wikispooks (Link)
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Targeting of Bernt Carlsson on Pan Am Flight 103
Sir Iain Livingstone
Chief Constable of Police Scotland
2 Clyde Gateway
French Street
Glasgow G40 4EH
Dear Sir Iain,
A fortnight ago, I wrote about two renowned Scottish journalists – Ian Bell and Kenneth Roy – who could never accept that the conviction of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi for the Lockerbie bombing was justified by the evidence presented at the Trial.
Contents
Journalist Ian Ferguson
Today, I am focusing on Scottish journalist and author Ian Ferguson who has been closely following the case since the November 1991 indictment of the two Libyans. In March 2000, just two months before the start of the Lockerbie bombing trial, Ferguson broadcast the documentary "Shadow Over Lockerbie" on American RadioWorks in which he probed an alleged secret drug smuggling operation run by the CIA in 1988 between the Middle East and Europe.
Ian Ferguson and Robert Black KC went on to create TheLockerbieTrial.com website where they recorded proceedings of both the Trial and subsequent Appeal. Midway between the 2000 Trial and 2002 Appeal, Ian Ferguson and fellow journalist John Ashton wrote a book entitled "Cover-up of Convenience: The Hidden Scandal of Lockerbie" which cast doubts over Megrahi's conviction.
Ian Ferguson was the researcher for the Anglo-Dutch documentary "Lockerbie Revisited" (never shown on British TV) which was broadcast in the Netherlands on 27 April 2009, the day before Abdelbaset al-Megrahi’s second Appeal began at the High Court of Justiciary in Edinburgh. A summary of "Lockerbie Revisited" can be read here. Ferguson spoke extensively throughout the film and concluded by saying:
- "This could bring an end to the appeal. If the Crown knew that this was all going to be heard in public, they may well drop their opposition to the appeal and al-Megrahi goes free. That's how f*****g important it is. This could bring the Scottish judicial system and the FBI into f*****g complete disrepute, and frankly they would not want this linen to be washed in public!"[1]
More recently, in relation to the kidnapping and abduction of Abu Agila Masud in November 2022, Ian Ferguson said:
- "The US and the Scottish Crown have never sought the truth in the Lockerbie affair. It was a reverse engineering affair…..the Libyans did it and let's go backwards and prove it."[2]
Reverting to Bernt Carlsson
In evidence given at the Lockerbie Trial on 15 June 2000, expert witness Alan Feraday identified at least 13 items said to be from the Brown Samsonite suitcase, which was alleged to have contained the bomb.
Journalist Ian Ferguson summarised the day's proceedings on his website THELOCKERBIETRIAL.COM:
- "Feraday pinpointed the location of the case down to the last centimetre, on the second layer of bags in container AVE4041. Immediately below where Feraday claims the bomb went off, investigators identified a grey Presikhaaf suitcase (belonging to UN Commissioner for Namibia, Bernt Carlsson).
- "In the early stages of the investigation, Bernt Carlsson's Presikhaaf suitcase was seen as the more likely bomb case. Police sources at the time said that this case was cleared of being the suspect case on November 23rd 1989.
- "To date not one item from the contents of Bernt Carlsson's Presikhaaf has been found. If there is a scientific reason why nothing has been found from this case, situated below the bomb case then it has not yet been explained in court. To a layperson it seems odd that the case adjacent to a bomb case should have no contents remaining, but from the bomb case itself we have an array of items.
- "So what happened to the contents of Bernt Carlsson's Presikhaaf suitcase?"[3]
As highlighted above, it is stated that Bernt Carlsson's Presikhaaf suitcase was considered to be the bomb bag for the first eleven months of the Lockerbie investigation. Why and by whom it was "cleared of being the suspect case on November 23rd 1989" we are not told.
South Africans targeted Carlsson
In his 2015 book "Coup d'Etat in Slow Motion: The Murder of Olof Palme", author Ole Dammegård wrote:
"Swedish national, Bertil Wedin, who was recruited by South African superspy Craig Williamson, said:
- 'I have the names of businessmen who know a lot about this – many things the investigators would need to know. A lot of information has been silenced.'
"According to Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet of 30 April 1991, Bernt Carlsson’s American girlfriend, Sanya Popovic, was told by him shortly before the Lockerbie catastrophe:
- 'I am one of the four or five people who know what really happened to Olof Palme'.
- “A diplomat (probably, Bernt Carlsson) knew about this, and told his friends in New York that he was afraid for his life. Some days later, he was one of the victims in the Lockerbie outrage of December 21, 1988, when Pan Am Flight 103 was blown to pieces over a small village in Scotland. In all, 270 people were killed. Bernt Carlsson was Palme’s closest co-worker in the mediating assignment between Iran and Iraq, and no doubt had insight into all aspects.
- "At the time of his death, Bernt Carlsson – who was a sworn adversary of Apartheid – had just been appointed UN Commissioner for Namibia, and was seen as a serious threat by the white regime of South Africa.
- "Because Bernt Carlsson knew too much, he had to be removed.
- "Investigations by the Austrian newspaper Kronen Zeitung proved that in fact South African agents had placed a specially-prepared bomb in Bernt Carlsson’s small tape recorder.
- "By blowing up a whole passenger plane in the air, the motive was hidden very effectively, because the investigators had no possibility of knowing which one of the passengers was the target."[4]
References
Time for a murder inquiry
In my view, the Bernt Carlsson murder inquiry should start by Police Scotland urgently reviewing:
- 1. DC John Crawford's "first fifteen" report on the interline passengers;
- 2. The FBI's FD402 report on Bernt Carlsson; and,
- 3. Why and by whom Bernt Carlsson's Presikhaaf suitcase was "cleared of being the suspect case on November 23rd 1989".
Once this has been done, and you have reported the result to me, we can decide how best the targeting of Bernt Carlsson on Pan Am Flight 103 can be investigated.
Yours sincerely,
(Royal Mail reference KL222703810GB https://www.royalmail.com/track-your-item#/tracking-results/KL222703810GB)
