A FORMER Midland doctor who lost his daughter in the Lockerbie atrocity hailed the defection of a key ally of Libyan dictactor Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

Dr Jim Swire said Musa Kusa’s flight to London on Wednesday night represented a “great day” for relatives of the 270 victims who died when Pan Am Flight 103 exploded in December 1998.

“Today those relatives who seek the truth about why their families were murdered should be rejoicing,” he said.

“Kusa was at the centre of Gaddafi’s inner circle. This is a guy who knows everything.

“I think this is a fantastic day for those who seek the truth about Lockerbie.

“He could tell us everything the Gaddafi regime knows.”

Dr Swire, who used to live in Bromsgrove, met Kusa, Gaddafi’s foreign affairs minister, during a visit to Libya in 1998 and said he was “extremely frightening. More frightening than Gaddafi himself”.

Dr Swire said: “He was clearly running things. If Libya was involved in Lockerbie, he can tell us how they carried out the atrocity and why.

“I would be appalled if, by now, the Scottish police are not in England interviewing Mr Kusa. It is a great day for us.”

Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi remains the only man convicted of the Lockerbie atrocity.

The Boeing 747 jumbo jet was en route from London to New York when it was blown out of the sky over the Dumfriesshire town.