Global Policy Forum

By Evelyn Leopold

United Nations - Libya officially informed the United Nations Friday it would turn over for trial by April 6 two men accused of blowing up a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, in December 1988.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan said he was "greatly encouraged by this development and said necessary arrangements'' would now be initiated'' by his staff. Annan has been mandated by the Security Council to arrange the handover of the suspects and has been passing messages on arrangements between Libya and the United States and Britain for months.

Libya's U.N. ambassador, Abuzed Omar Dorda, delivered a letter to Annan in a hastily-arranged meeting after South African President Nelson Mandela announced in Tripoli that Libya had set a date for the handover to a Scottish court sitting in the Netherlands.

The official letter, obtained by Reuters, said that Libya had agreed "to ensure that the two suspects would be available to the secretary-general of the United Nations to take custody of them on or before 6 April, 1999 for their appearance before the court.'' Mandela made the announcement in Tripoli with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi looking on and Dorda and U.N. sources said the letter included all the points Mandela had made.

The United States and Britain say they have convincing evidence the two men -- Abdel Basset Ali Mohamed al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah -- planted the bomb that blew up Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie on Dec. 21, 1988, killing 270 people in the air and on the ground.

After initial skepticism, the State Department welcomed the development. Spokesman James Foley said in Washington, "We welcome the news that we have heard from President Mandela today. We are expecting the turnover of the two suspects to custody in the Netherlands on or before April 6.''

One potential stumbling point in the agreement announced by Mandela is that Libya wants the Security Council to adopt a resolution on all the arrangements concerning the suspects. But Dorda said this was not a condition. "It is our wish. We had better leave it in the hands of the secretary-general.''

Under Security Council resolutions U.N. sanctions against Libya are suspended once the two suspects arrive in the Netherlands. Following a report by Annan after 90 days, the council must vote to lift them permanently. Mandela said the sanctions, imposed in 1992 and tightened in 1993, would definitely be lifted after Annan's report, indicating Washington and London may have given private assurances they would vote in favor.

Annan has to report on Libya's cooperation on giving information on alleged terrorist bases in its country and whether Tripoli had cooperated satisfactorily with France on the 1989 mid-flight bombing of a UTA airliner over Niger in which 171 people died.

The key aspect of the sanctions is a ban on flights into and out of Libya, forcing Libyans to travel abroad either by sea or by land to Egypt or Tunisia. The sanctions also include a ban on some oil equipment.

In August 1998, London and Washington dropped their insistence on a trial in either of their countries and agreed to one in the Netherlands before a Scottish judge, under Scottish law in accordance with Libya's oft-stated willingness to accept a trial in a so-called "neutral'' venue. But Libya then spent months seeking clarifications and guarantees on details such as where the men would serve any sentences and when the United Nations would lift sanctions.

The families of some of the 270 people killed in the Lockerbie explosion were skeptical. "My feeling is that the proof is in the pudding,'' said Stephanie Bernstein of Bethesda, Maryland, who lost her husband, Justice Department official Michael Bernstein. "The proof is when the suspects arrive in the Netherlands.''