Decades later, U.S. sets Lockerbie trial in motion

Almost 40 years on, the U.S. continues to probe into the Lockerbie bombing, reopening questions over Libya’s involvement in one of the deadliest and most chronicled terrorist attacks in modern Western history.

In a report submitted to the National ahead of a June 5 hearing, a federal court is expected to set a schedule in the lead-up to the April 2026 trial of Abu Agila Mohammad Masud; the man who allegedly built the Lockerbie bomb.

On December 21, 1988,  a flight en route to New York was blown up as it flew over the Scottish town of Lockerbie. A bomb exploded in the Plane’s cargo hold, killing all 259 passengers on Pan Am 103, including 190 U.S. citizens.

Masud, now 73, allegedly served as a bombmaker for Libyan intelligence. In 2020, the U.S. government filed charges against him, but it took more than two years to extradite him from Libya. In 2023, Masud pleaded not guilty.

“Given the complex, international nature of the evidence in this case, that pretrial schedule will have several atypical features,” the report reads. Namely, at least three depositions of foreign nationals will have to take place outside the US before the trial begins.

Masud’s deteriorating health has complicated trial preparation, though his court-appointed lawyers have said they “will certainly endeavor to provide the court whatever updates we can regarding the medical appointments.”

The only prior conviction related to the attack was that of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who was jailed in Scotland in 2001 but later released on compassionate grounds. He died in Libya in 2012.

While Libya officially accepted responsibility for the attack in 2003, successive Libyan governments have disputed the details of involvement.

U.S. prosecutors have pointed to unverified documents detailing suitcase bomb experiments, implicating Masud in planning both the Pan Am 103 and UTA Flight 772 attacks, calling them “dynamite evidence.”

However many, including some families of the Lockerbie victims, have questioned the U.S.’s integrity in the trial, accusing the government of scapegoating Libya. They argue that these documents have been known to courts since 2018, and are only now being cited to expedite the case.

The National / Maghrebi