The Best News I've Heard From Libya

You may not be old enough, but I remember this story, and how, at age 22, I keenly felt the injustice of letting a terrorist murderer get away. But maybe not forever (H/T: Stormbringer):

The man suspected of murdering PC Yvonne Fletcher outside the Libyan embassy in London in 1984 has been arrested by rebel forces in the country and is in custody in the rebel stronghold of Benghazi.

Campaigners welcomed the arrest and expressed the hope that Omar Ahmed Sodani would face trial in Britain.

PC Yvonne Fletcher

Sodani, a prominent figure in Muammar Gaddafi's regime who acknowledges that he was working in the embassy at the time of the shooting, insisted he had not killed 25-year-old Fletcher.

Speaking in custody in Benghazi, he told Channel 4 News: "I was there but I wasn't at the scene when the shooting took place. I was in police custody before that. I had a quarrel with a police officer before the event, so I was detained and I was told while I was in the police station that a shooting took place and a police officer was shot."

Fletcher lay dying after being shot in 1984

Fletcher was helping to control a small demonstration outside the embassy in St James's Square on 17 April 1984 when shots were fired from the first floor of the building at the protestors. She was shot in the stomach and died in hospital.

Armed police surrounded the embassy in an 11-day siege. Gaddafi responded by sending forces to surround the British embassy in Tripoli. The sieges ended when staff in both embassies were allowed to leave. Britain broke off diplomatic relations with Libya. Libyan embassy staff, who were expelled from Britain, claimed diplomatic immunity which meant they could not be questioned by police. Nobody has faced justice for the shooting.