Gaddafi can be prosecuted for bombing -- French court

Gaddafi can be prosecuted for bombing -- French court
REUTERS

PARIS, OCT 20: A French appeals court ruled on Friday that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi could be prosecuted in France for the bombing of a French DC-10 airliner over Niger in 1989 in which 170 people died, judicial sources said.

The court upheld an investigating magistrate's earlier ruling, rejecting an argument from state prosecutors that Gaddafi enjoyed immunity as a serving head of state.

The landmark ruling said immunity did not apply to terrorism and backed anti-terrorist investigating magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere, who wants to bring Gaddafi to trial for ``complicity in murder in relation to a terrorist act''.

``Terrorism is a serious crime that will not go unpunished, even when a head of state is involved,'' said Francoise Rudetsky, who heads the SOS-Attacks group of victims of terrorist attacks.

``This is a great victory going beyond the DC-10 bombing and the Pinochet case,'' she said.

French state prosecutors, in line with a British decision to hold former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet on human rights charges, had argued that a head of state's immunity could be lifted only in the case of crimes against humanity.

Britain eventually freed Pinochet on the grounds that he was unfit to be extradited to stand trial in Spain.

Gaddafi's lawyer Francois Gibault played down the ruling as a purely legal decision that did not imply his client was guilty.

The judicial sources said the state prosecutor was likely to appeal to the Supreme Court, the Cour de Cassation, against a ruling that embarrasses the Paris Government just as it is improving relations with Tripoli.

French Foreign Ministry spokesman Francois Rivasseau declined to comment on the ruling and said the rapprochement between Paris and Tripoli was likely to continue.

Paris considered inviting Gaddafi to a summit of European and Mediterranean leaders in Marseille next month. The meeting has since been scaled down to the foreign minister's level, mostly because West Asian tensions would have made a summit difficult.

French Cooperation Minister Charles Josselin visited Tripoli last month to thank Gaddafi after Libya helped win the release of French hostages held by Muslim rebels on the Philippines island of Jolo.

Relatives of the victims of the Niger bombing launched the legal action against the Libyan leader after Bruguiere's 10-year investigation led to a French court in 1999 sentencing six Libyans, including Gaddafi's brother-in-law, in absentia to life imprisonment.

The six were held responsible for the bombing of a UTA DC-10 over Niger. Paris has issued international arrest warrants for the six in case they ever leave Libya. Franco-Libyan relations began warming up again after Tripoli paid more than 200 million French Francs ($25.7 million) compensation to the families of the victims, last year.

Paris took the payment as acknowledgement of responsibility, but Gaddafi denied any admission of guilt on the part of Libya.

Gaddafi met French President Jacques Chirac and several other Western leaders during an Africa-Europe summit in Egypt, and French Industry Minister Christian Pierret visited Tripoli's trade fair with a large business group, earlier this year.

Ties between France and Libya had been virtually frozen since the 1989 bombing.

UTA Flight-772 from Brazzaville to Paris crashed at a time of high tension between Libya and France over Chad, where the two countries' armies clashed repeatedly in the 1970s and 1980s.

Bruguiere's suit against Gaddafi alleged that Libya had supplied logistical aid for the bombing, given protection to the people since convicted, and supplied false documents during the investigation.

The United Nations lifted sanctions against Libya last September after Tripoli handed over for trial in the Netherlands two Libyan suspects charged with the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, that killed 270 people.