File, Newscom
An official with Libya's rebel government says it will not extradite the mastermind behind the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland. The former Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was being held in Scottish prison for the death of 270 people, 189 of whom were Americans. Megrahi was released on the grounds that he was terminally ill, but his joyful welcome home and failure to die infuriated the United States, which has since demanded his return. But death may soon be near. CNN has reported that Megrahi is dying at his villa in the capital and broadcasted images of a sickly man in an oxygen mask. The Libyan official told reporters that only Gaddafi hands over his own citizens, not them. Megrahi's passing would help eliminate mounting friction between the rebels’ Transitional National Council and its Western supporters.