Two suspects have been identified in the 1988 Lockerbie plane bombing that killed 270 people after a suitcase bomb exploded on board Pan Am Flight 103 to New York.
Prosecutors with Scotland's Crown Office want to interview two Libyans whom they have identified as prime suspects for the incident. They two now join Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who died from prostate cancer in 2012 while protesting his innocence, as those considered responsible for the bombing. The names of the two new suspects have not been announced.
On Dec. 21, 1988, a bomb detonated on a Boeing 747 traveling from London to New York City just after takeoff, killing everyone on board, including 189 Americans. Even though the plane involved mostly Americans, and was a flight involving Britain and the U.S., the plane crashed in Lockerbie, Scotland, thus making the investigation the jurisdiction of Scottish authorities.
Scotland's Lord Advocate Frank Mulholland QC recently met with U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch in Washington, D.C., to review progress made in the investigation, reported Newsweek. They are now seeking the assistance of Libyan judicial authorities to allow Scottish police officers and the FBI to interview the two named suspects in Tripoli.
A Crown Office spokesman said: "The Lord Advocate and the U.S. Attorney General have recently agreed that there is a proper basis in law in Scotland and the United States to entitle Scottish and U.S. investigators to treat two Libyans as suspects in the continuing investigation into the bombing of flight Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie."
"The Lord Advocate has today, therefore, issued an International Letter of Request to the Libyan attorney general in Tripoli which identifies the two Libyans as suspects in the bombing of flight Pan Am 103," the spokesman continued, according to the BBC. "The two individuals are suspected of involvement, along with Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, in the bombing of flight Pan Am 103 in December 1988 and the murder of 270 people."
