Bernt Carlsson
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Bernt Wilmar Carlsson was a Swedish diplomat. He was born in 1938 in Stockholm, Sweden, and died in the Lockerbie bombing on December 21, 1988.
Contents |
[edit] Evolution to international diplomacy
Bernt Carlsson joined the Swedish Social Democratic Youth League when he was sixteen, studied economics at Stockholm University and, upon graduation, went into Sweden's foreign ministry. Carlsson was assistant to the Minister of Commerce in 1967 and, three years later, was detached to become international secretary of the ruling Social Democratic Party of Sweden in 1970. Concurrent with his position in the party, Prime Minister, Olof Palme (assassinated on February 28, 1986), appointed him as special adviser.
In 1976, he became Secretary-General of Socialist International (SI), based in London, at the same time as former Federal German Chancellor, Willy Brandt, assumed the SI presidency. For the next seven years, Carlsson was engaged in extending the SI's influence beyond Europe to Third World countries, and in pioneering moves towards Middle East peace using the SI's unique position of having Israel's governing Labour Party as a member, and at the same time retaining very good ties with Arab countries and Yasser Arafat's faction in the PLO. Carlsson developed a particularly close relationship with Arafat's right-hand man, Issam Sartawi, who was murdered (allegedly by the Abu Nidal Organization) during an SI conference in Portugal on April 10, 1983.
He returned home to Sweden in 1983 and, for two years, became the Prime Minister's special emissary to the Middle East and Africa. Palme entrusted him with an important Middle East role in delicate attempts to negotiate a peace agreement between Iran and Iraq. From 1985 to 1987 he was head of Nordic Affairs in the Swedish foreign ministry.
On July 1, 1987 Carlsson was appointed United Nations Commissioner for South-West Africa/Namibia. A year later, he convened a meeting in Stockholm between the SWAPO leadership (Sam Nujoma, Hage Geingob and Hidipo Hamutenya), and a delegation of "whites" from Namibia.
[edit] Reclaiming Namibia for the UN
Following the Reagan/Gorbachev summit on September 29, 1988, implementation of Security Council resolution 435 began. South Africa was thereby required finally to relinquish its control of Namibia. The UN Commissioner planned to fly direct from Brussels on December 20, 1988 (where Carlsson had a long-standing speaking engagement before a sub-committee of the European parliament) to New York for a signing ceremony on December 22 at UN headquarters. Carlsson would then take control of Namibia. But, according to Swedish newspaper iDAG of March 12, 1990, Carlsson had been pressured by De Beers to stopover in London to discuss Namibia's diamonds. Thus, he became one of the 270 victims of Pan Am Flight 103.
South African foreign minister, Pik Botha, and a delegation of 22 negotiators – including defence minister, General Magnus Malan, and head of military intelligence, General C J Van Tonder – were also booked on PA 103 to attend the same signing ceremony at the UN. But, instead, Pik Botha and a smaller contingent of six took the Pan Am 101 morning flight to New York. The rest of the South African party cancelled the booking on PA 103 and returned to Johannesburg.
[edit] The prime target?
According to one theory, promoted by a few commentators – such as former British diplomat Patrick Haseldine – and with some supporting circumstantial evidence, Bernt Carlsson was actually alleged to have been the saboteurs' target in the Lockerbie bombing.
Whereas apartheid South Africa had a plausible motive (to prevent the UN Commissioner from reclaiming Namibia), and had both the opportunity and capability to carry out this crime, it seems that, barring a confession (possible), or a new criminal investigation followed by another lengthy trial (unlikely), the alleged perpetrators can expect to escape ever being brought to justice.
The allegation that – among the 270 fatalities of the Lockerbie bombing – Carlsson was the prime target is therefore likely to remain unproven.
[edit] Memorial
The Bernt Carlsson Trust – otherwise known as One World Action – was founded by Glenys Kinnock on December 21, 1989 (the first anniversary of the Lockerbie air disaster) in memory of Carlsson.
In Windhoek, Namibia a street in the Pionierpark Extension 1 township is named "Bernt Carlsson Road".
[edit] See also
- Olof Palme
- Alternative theories into the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103#South-West Africa (Namibia)
- Craig Williamson
- Dag Hammarskjöld
