Kto zabił Hammarskjolda ?

Po dziennikarskim śledztwie z 2011 roku będzie nowe śledztwo w sprawie tajemniczej katastrofy samolotu w którym podróżował w 1961 roku ówczesny sekretarz generalny ONZ, Dag Hammarskjold. Według świadka, na pokładzie samolotu nastąpił wybuch.

18 września 1961 roku, podczas podchodzenia do lądowania w dzisiejszej Zambii, runął na ziemie samolot w którym podróżował ówczesny sekretarz generalny ONZ, Dag Hammarskjold. Tylko jedna osoba przeżyła katastrofę. Brytyjska komisja lotnicza stwierdziła ze powodem wypadku był "błąd pilota".

Rok temu brytyjski dziennik "The Guardian" wszczął dziennikarskie śledztwo na podstawie nowych informacji. I nikt nie określił dziennikarzy "oszołomami":

http://monsieurb.nowyekran.pl/post/27034,dziwna-smierc-sekretarza-onz

W międzyczasie wyszła tez nowa książka pod tytułem "Kto zabił Hammarskjolda?" (poniżej). Nowe ujawnione informacje zostały najpierw przeanalizowane przez specjalny trzyosobowy komitet ekspertów, złożony z Lorda Lea of Crondall, byłego sekretarza generalnego Commonweath’u Emeki Anyaoku i byłego prymasa Szwecji Karla Gustawa Hammara.

Następnie została powołana międzynarodowa komisja śledcza, złożona z: 

– emerytowanego brytyjskiego sędziego, Sir Stephena Sedley’a 

– byłego sędziego Trybunału w Hadze, Richarda Gladstona

– byłego szwedzkiego ambasadora, Hansa Corell’a

– holenderskiej sędziny, Wilhelminy Thomassen 

Ocalały świadek katastrofy twierdzi że na pokładzie samolotu nastąpił wybuch. 

Komisja śledcza spróbuje także znaleźć odpowiedzi m.in. na pytania dlaczego świadkowie na ziemi twierdza że widzieli drugi mniejszy samolot atakujący samolot DC-6 w którym leciał Hammarskjold oraz dlaczego oficjalnie znaleziono wrak samolotu dopiero 15 godzin po katastrofie mimo że znajdował się on tylko 12 kilometrów od lotniska ?

Who Killed Hammarskjold?

Commentary by Trevor Grundy, Africa Correspondent of the Commonwealth Journalists Association

A new book about the legendary UN Secretary General, Dag Hammarskjold, has been lauded by academics and journalists as the world remembers the great statesman’s  mysterious death on the Copperbelt of Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) during the early hours of 18 September 1961.

"Who killed Hammarskjold by the Susan Williams is a short, taut and highly readable account of Hammarskjold’s death that suggests strongly that the Secretary-General was the victim of a conspiracy hatched by some supporters of continued white domination in central Africa," writes the African expert and author Stephen Ellis (Season of Rains – Africa in the World Hurst & Company London 2011)

"The death of Dag Hammarskjold is a major historical puzzle," writes James Mayall, the Sir Patrick Sheehy Professor of International Relations at the University of Cambridge. "Susan Williams has left very few stones unturned in her attempt to unravel it."

And author Gerard Prunier declares – ". as exciting as a James Bond novel, this important book, which vividly conveys the tumultuous decolonization of the Congo is the one for you."

The book was launched at the University of London on Friday 2 September after a one-day seminar on Dag Hammarskjold, the United Nations and the End of Empire held under the auspices of the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation in Uppsala and the UN Association of the UK.

Some of the world’s best authorities on Africa – including Professor David Anderson, Professor of African Politics and Fellow of St Cross College, Oxford and Professor Wm. Roger Louis, CBE, the Kerr Professor of English History and Culture and Director of British Studies at the University of Texas, Austin and author of the The End of British Imperialism – The Scramble for Empire, Suez and Decolonisation (I.B. Tauris, 2006) – spoke at the seminar.

Others were Dr Benjamin Zachariah, Reader in South Asian History, University of Sheffield: Ludo De Witte from Belgium and author of the best-selling The Assassination of Lumumba (2001): Lord (Douglas) Hurd, diplomat, historian and former British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs and Dr Henning Melber, Executive Director of the Dag Hammarskjold Foundation.

The conference was attended by a cross-section of influential African academics, authors and journalists. One of the world’s great authorities on Latin America, Hugh O’Shaughnessy was in the audience. So was Barbara Hall MBE who lived and worked in Northern Rhodesia at the time of Hammarskjold’s death. It was also attended by the Deputy Secretary-General of the Commonwealth Secretariat, Mrs Mwasekgoa Masire-Mwamba. Susan Williams has published widely on Africa. She received widespread acclaim for her book on the founding president of Botswana, Sir Seretse Khama. She is a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, University of London.

Although Hammarskjöld’s death/murder/assassination took place such a long time ago, it is attracting fresh attention from academics, UN scholars, Africanists and journalists because of the date – 50 years ago on 18 September. During the previous evening, a UN-chartered DC-6B plane code-named "Albertina" took off from Leopoldville (now Kinshasa) capital of the freshly independent Republic of the Congo on a 1,000 miles circuitous route to Ndola, where Dag Hammarskjold was scheduled to hold talks with Moise Tshombe who was the leader of the break-away copper-rich Katanga. Reports say that soon after midnight, a large flash of light was seen in the sky near Ndola Airport and that afternoon the wreckage of the plane was found nine miles away, along with 15 badly burned bodies.

Who Killed Hammarskjold: The UN, the Cold War and White Supremacy in Africa by Susan Williams is published by Hurst and Company, London, September 2011 306 pp and is available from 30 Degrees South UK priced £20.00 + P&P.