WASHINGTON (AP) — A Libyan intelligence official accused of making the bomb that brought down Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988 in an international act of terrorism has been taken into U.S. custody and will face federal charges in Washington, the Justice Department said Sunday.

The arrest of Abu Agela Masud Kheir Al-Marimi is a significant milestone in the decades-old investigation into the attack that killed 259 people in the air and 11 on the ground. American authorities in December 2020 announced charges against Masud, who was in Libyan custody at the time. Though he is the third Libyan intelligence official charged in the U.S. in connection with the attack, he would be the first to appear in an American courtroom for prosecution.

The New York-bound Pan Am flight exploded over Lockerbie less than an hour after takeoff from London on Dec. 21, 1988. Citizens from 21 different countries were killed. Among the 190 Americans on board were 35 Syracuse University students flying home for Christmas after a semester abroad.

The bombing laid bare the threat of international terrorism more than a decade before the Sept. 11 attacks. It produced global investigations and punishing sanctions while spurring demands for accountability from victims of those killed.

The announcement of charges against Masud on Dec. 21, 2020, came on the 32nd anniversary of the bombing and in the final days of the tenure of then-Attorney General William Barr, who in his first stint as attorney general in the early 1990s had announced criminal charges against two other Libyans intelligence officials.

The Libyan government initially balked at turning over the two men, Abdel Baset Ali al-Megrahi and Lamen Khalifa Fhimah, before ultimately surrendering them for prosecution before a panel of Scottish judges sitting in the Netherlands as part of a special arrangement.

The Justice Department said Masud appear soon in a federal court in Washington, where he faces two criminal counts related to the explosion.

U.S. officials did not say how Masud came to be taken into U.S. custody, but in late November, local Libyan media reported that Masud had been kidnapped by armed men on Nov. 16 from his residence in Tripoli, the capital. That reporting cited a family statement that accused Tripoli authorities of being silent on the abduction.

On Nov. 21, Najla Mangoush, the foreign minister for the country’s Tripoli-based government, told the BBC in an interview that “we, as a government, are very open in terms of collaboration in this matter,” when asked whether an extradition was possible.

Torn by civil war since 2011, Libya is divided between rival governments in the east and west, each backed by international patrons and numerous armed militias on the ground. Militia groups have amassed great wealth and power from kidnappings and their involvement in Libya’s lucrative human trafficking trade

A breakthrough in the investigation came when U.S. officials in 2017 received a copy of an interview that Masud, a longtime explosives expert for Libya’s intelligence service, had given to Libyan law enforcement in 2012 after being taken into custody following the collapse of the government of the country’s leader, Col. Moammar Gadhafi.

In that interview, U.S. officials said, Masud admitted building the bomb in the Pan Am attack and working with two other conspirators to carry it out. He also said the operation was ordered by Libyan intelligence and that Gadhafi thanked him and other members of the team after the attack, according to an FBI affidavit filed in the case.

That affidavit said Masud told Libyan law enforcement that he flew to Malta to meet al-Megrahi and Fhimah. He handed Fhimah a medium-sized Samsonite suitcase containing a bomb, having already been instructed to set the timer so that the device would explode exactly 11 hours later, according to the document. He then flew to Tripoli, the FBI said.

Al-Megrahi was convicted in the Netherlands while Fhimah was acquitted of all charges. Al-Megrahi was given a life sentence, but Scottish authorities released him on humanitarian grounds in 2009 after he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He later died in Tripoli, still protesting his innocence.

In announcing charges against Masud in 2020, Barr said the U.S. and Scotland would use “every feasible and appropriate means” to bring him to trial.

“At long last, this man responsible for killing Americans and many others will be subject to justice for his crimes,” Barr said at the time.

Scotland’s Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service on Sunday announced the arrest as well, saying in a statement that “the families of those killed in the Lockerbie bombing have been told that the suspect is in U.S. custody.”

The statement added that “Scottish prosecutors and police, working with U.K. government and U.S. colleagues, will continue to pursue this investigation, with the sole aim of bringing those who acted along with al-Megrahi to justice.”

© Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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The post 300,000 residents of Odesa region still have no electricity appeared first on Ukraine Intelligence.

KYIV (Reuters) – The Ukrainian port of Odesa was not operating on Sunday after the latest Russian attack on the region’s energy system, Agriculture Minister Mykola Solsky said, but added that grains traders were not expected to suspend exports.

Two other ports – Chornomorsk and Pivdennyi – authorised to export grains from Ukraine under a deal between Russia and Ukraine were partially operating, he said.

“Chornomorsk port is now operating at about 80% of capacity,” Solsky told Reuters in a phone call.

More than 1.5 million people in the southern Odesa region were without power after Russian drone strikes hit two energy facilities, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in a video address late on Saturday.

Solsky said that Odesa port was not operating at the moment because the power generators had not been switched on yet. Grains traders continued to ship grains via the two other ports, he said.

“There are problems, but none of the traders are talking about any suspension of shipments. Ports use alternative energy sources,” Solsky said.

Since October, Moscow has been targeting Ukraine’s energy infrastructure with large waves of missile and drone strikes.

Odesa regional authorities said electricity for the city’s population will be restored “in the coming days,” while complete restoration of the networks may take two to three months.

“The situation is difficult to predict because we are dealing with an enemy for whom there are no principles,” the Ukrainian infrastructure ministry quoted Oleksiy Vostrikov, the head of Ukraine’s state seaport authority, as saying.

“As for exports, Russia has already slowed them down by creating problems with inspections in the Bosporus, and the lack of energy supply will certainly slow them down even more,” Vostrikov said.

Ukraine is among the world’s largest producers and exporters of corn and wheat but its exports have fallen significantly due to the Russian invasion.

After an almost six-month blockade caused by the invasion, the three Black Sea ports in the Odesa region were unblocked at the end of July under the deal between Moscow and Kyiv brokered by the United Nations and Turkey.

Kyiv had sought to have the agreement expanded to include more ports, but that has not been concluded so far.

The three ports involved in the deal – Odesa, Chornomorsk and Pivdennyi – have the combined capacity to ship around three million tonnes of grains a month.

Ukraine wanted to include the ports of the southern Mykolaiv region, which shipped 35% of Ukrainian food exports before Russia’s invasion.

Mykolaiv was Ukraine’s second-largest grain terminal according to 2021 shipment data, so its addition would allow for a much larger volume of grains and oilseeds to be exported.

Grain exports from Ukraine in the first eight days of December fell 47.6% from a year earlier to 1.09 million tonnes, agriculture ministry data showed.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — A nonprofit group that became a point of controversy for distributing hundreds of millions of dollars in election grants during the 2020 presidential campaign is releasing a fresh round of money to local election offices, including in states where Republican lawmakers tried to ban the practice.

The Chicago-based Center for Tech and Civic Life has released only general details about how much money each office will receive or what it will fund.

It has said 10 county and municipal election offices will be part of the first group to receive grant money under the center’s U.S. Alliance for Election Excellence, which has $80 million to hand out over the next five years, with few restrictions.

Conservatives took aim at the center during the last presidential race after it gave local election offices around the country more than $350 million, almost all of it donated by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Opponents termed the grants “Zuckerbucks” and claimed they were an attempt by the billionaire to tip the vote in favor of Democrats, although there was no evidence to support that.

Much of the earlier money went to election offices in urban areas that have traditionally supported Democrats, but the center pointed out that it gave funding to every office that requested it – nearly 2,500 in all. The center previously said the current round of grant funding will not include money from Zuckerberg.

The center did not initially disclose the amounts each jurisdiction would be eligible to receive, but it posted a range of figures two weeks after the initial announcement in response to questions from The Associated Press.

Grant amounts will vary based on the size of each jurisdiction, from $50,000 for those with fewer than 5,000 registered voters to $3 million for those with more than 1 million voters. The first offices will receive grants over a two-year period leading up to the 2024 presidential election, said Tiana Epps-Johnson, the center’s executive director.

The money comes with almost no restrictions on how it can be spent. Election officials said they hope to use the grants for everything from improving websites to recruiting poll workers and building larger, more secure office spaces.

The center’s hesitancy to disclose details about its renewed efforts has drawn criticism from the same conservative groups that opposed its work in 2020.

“It seems like this entire process will occur behind the scenes with no guardrails or transparency, furthering the concerns of voters over undue influence on the conduct of elections,” said Hayden Dublois, a researcher at the conservative Foundation for Government Accountability.

The center’s grants will not fund offices in any of the more than 20 states where Republicans enacted laws since 2020 that ban private funding for elections, but it will go to offices in some states where Democratic governors vetoed bans passed by Republican-controlled legislatures. That includes Michigan, North Carolina and Wisconsin.

Dublois said he was skeptical of the list of jurisdictions the center chose to support. The center declined to provide specific details about how it selected members of the alliance.

“It seems most of the targets for the alliance are geared towards blue states, with some Democratic strongholds in swing states included, as well,” he said, voicing concerns that increased funding could boost Democratic turnout.

Five of the selected jurisdictions lean Republican, but they make up only a fraction of the total population in the more Democratic jurisdictions.

The initial election offices selected are: Contra Costa and Shasta counties in California; Greenwich, Connecticut; Kane and Macoupin counties in Illinois; Ottawa County, Michigan; Clark County, Nevada; Brunswick and Forsyth counties in North Carolina; and Madison, Wisconsin.

In Wisconsin, a perennial political battleground where former President Donald Trump has sought to decertify the results of the 2020 presidential election, Republican lawmakers tried to work around Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ veto power this spring by proposing an amendment to the state constitution that would ban private funding for elections. The proposal passed the Legislature but would need a second consecutive approval in 2023 before it could be put to a statewide vote.

Madison Deputy Clerk Jim Verbick said he saw joining the alliance as a way to stay current on how other election officials are operating. He said his office will consider accepting grants and wasn’t worried about the city’s involvement drawing backlash.

“The issue has gone to the courts, and the courts have repeatedly said there was nothing wrong with the grants,” he said.

Top Wisconsin Republicans said they believe the program has partisan aims.

“This is just liberals telling other liberals they are doing a good job,” said Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, the state’s top Republican. “Cities like Madison and Milwaukee continue to try to find ways to only engage with and turn out certain voters.”

The center and participating election officials have stressed that the alliance’s work is nonpartisan, but the lack of publicly available details about how they selected the offices and how the money will be used has fed conservatives’ concerns.

“Our citizens should have peace of mind that the outcomes of elections are not affected by the flow of private money into election administration,” said Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Tyler August, Vos’ second in command who sponsored the proposed amendment to ban election grants.

In Michigan, more than 460 election offices accepted grants from the center in 2020. The state now has constitutional protections for private grants thanks to a voting-related ballot initiative voters passed in November.

Opponents such as Jamie Roe of Secure MI Vote criticize what they see as special interest groups trying to influence elections. The group pushed unsuccessfully for private funding to be outlawed.

“The elected officials and the clerks in Michigan need to know that they’re going to be held accountable,” Roe said. “They should be very careful about what sort of agreements they enter into with special interests.”

Two recipients stand out: deeply Republican Shasta County in the rural, far northern part of California and Democratic-leaning Clark County in Nevada. Both have been on the front lines of election conspiracies.

Clark County, home to nearly three-quarters of registered voters in the presidential battleground state, has been the target of false claims that the 2020 presidential election was rigged to favor Democrats. County spokesperson Dan Kulin said the county’s handling of mail ballots likely contributed to its selection. It’s the only jurisdiction in the alliance with enough registered voters to be eligible for up to $3 million in grants.

Several Republican groups in the state did not respond to phone calls and emails.

Shasta County has been roiled by far-right politics since the 2020 presidential election. Election workers have been followed while delivering ballots and monitored by trail cameras outside their office, The Los Angeles Times reported. County Clerk Cathy Darling Allen said she has feared for the safety of her staff. The Shasta County elections office received $95,000 from the center in 2020 and now is eligible for $1.5 million.

“The doubts about election administration that have been sown on social media particularly have been troubling and difficult to quash,” Darling Allen told the AP.

She said she hopes to present the county’s participation in the alliance early next year to the board of supervisors, where far-right candidates secured four of the five seats in November’s election.

One of the newly elected supervisors, Kevin Crye, said he had concerns about “who and how our electoral process can possibly be manipulated,” but declined to elaborate.

© Copyright 2022 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

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