That love is there in spades in Dr Jim Swi+re, whose daughter Flora died in the plane that exploded over the Dumfries and Galloway village of Lockerbie just a little more than 36 years ago. But far from settling for being the emotional wreck that most of us would become on losing a lovely, gifted 23-year-old daughter, public-school educated, churchgoing Jim Swire turned into an indefatigable member of the awkward squad.
When Flight 103 was blown out of the sky on 21 December 1988, the initial suspicion was that it was the work of the Palestinian guerrilla group PFLP-GC, based in Damascus and put up to it by the Iranians. A US missile in the Gulf had recently shot down an Iranian commercial plane full of civilians during the Iran-Iraq war so, the argument went, it would make sense for Iran’s hardline government to retaliate with a spectacular assault on a packed Pan Am jumbo jet.
Eventually, in 2001, Megrahi was found guilty of the murder of 270 people by a special court in the Netherlands, made up of Scottish judges, and sentenced to life imprisonment. His alleged accomplice was found not guilty.
Jim Swire had been one of those demanding Megrahi be tried, and had flown to Tripoli to ask the Libyan president for the case to go ahead. But following the court case Swire was not persuaded. “I went into that court thinking I was going to see the trial of those who were responsible for the murder of my daughter,” he said later. “I came out thinking he had been framed. I am very afraid that we saw steps taken to ensure that a politically desired result was obtained.”
But Swire was not alone. Large gaps in the evidence had emerged. The key piece of forensics was discredited. A key witness, paid by the CIA to appear, was hugely unimpressive, and evidence that would have helped the defence was not passed on by the Crown. Professor Hans Köchler, a UN-appointed legal adviser, called the case “inconsistent, arbitrary and a spectacular miscarriage of justice”. The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission found six reasons for believing “a miscarriage of justice may have occurred”. Megrahi, suffering from cancer, was released in 2009 – too soon for many – and died in 2012.
Lockerbie is a crushing reminder of the worst terrorist attack in UK history
Read MoreI remember Jim Swire telling me the US decided “to blame somebody, anybody, rather than Iran”, and noting elsewhere “the extraordinary coincidence of the first hostages being set free within a few days of the accusations being made against the two Libyans”.
The film depicts Jane Swire’s frustration with her husband’s refusal to let the matter lie. Eleven years ago I asked Jane Swire about her husband’s campaigning: “He’s been promising to give it up for a long time. I’ll believe it when I see it,” she said, without apparent rancour. “He’s like a dog on a hunt. He has to chase every hare until he gets a narrative that makes sense. I am uncertain that we’ll ever know the truth. At the very core of it, none of it will bring Flora back. I’ve had enough to cope with.”
And he’s still at it. Swire said last week: “What I discovered was horrendous, and I’ve been able to discover enough about the truth to know that the official version that you and I are being solemnly told, to this day, particularly by the Americans, but also by the UK authorities, is absolute nonsense.”
If a screenplay can do for all the Lockerbie bereaved, the Swires and beyond, what it did for the Post Office subpostmasters, hurrah.
Lockerbie: A Search for Truth is on Sky Atlantic now
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