WPC Fletcher 'placed in front of firing squad', claims colleague

Libyan justice minister Salah al Marghani has said the country is offering Britain full transparency and help in bringing WPC Yvonne Fletcher's killer to justice.

"It is another crime of the Gaddafi regime and there is full cooperation in this case and we have 100 per cent open lines with the UK on these issues," Mr al Marghani said.

Newly released government files have shown Libya twice warned the UK of potential violence on the eve of the shooting of Ms Fletcher outside the Libyan People's Bureau in London in 1984.

The gunman who fired the fatal shot from inside the embassy has never been identified.

Read: WPC Yvonne Fletcher was placed in front of 'firing squad'

The former British ambassador in Tripoli has told ITV News he took a threat of violence on the eve of the shooting of WPc Yvonne Fletcher "seriously" after it was revealed he bet a Libyan diplomat that nothing would happen.

Oliver Miles was summoned to the Libyan foreign ministry shortly after midnight on April 17 1984 to receive a warning of possible violence if a planned demonstration by opponents of Colonel Gaddafi went ahead that day outside the Libyan People's Bureau in London.

Mr Miles filed a telegram to the Foreign Office (FCO) reporting the warning, one of a number of documents released under the 30-year rule by the National Archives.

Other papers show two officials from the People's Bureau also telephoned the FCO to express concern about the demonstration the next day.

"I did take it seriously and that's why I reported it to London," Mr Miles told ITV News. "I didn't know, of course, that there was going to be a shooting. I thought they were simply trying to have the demonstration stopped."

Read: WPc Fletcher was placed in front of 'firing squad'

Libya twice warned the Foreign Office of potential violence on eve of the shooting of WPC Yvonne Fletcher outside the Libyan People's Bureau in London, according to newly-released government files.

Papers from 1984 released by the National Archives in Kew, west London, show Libyan officials in both London and Tripoli warned they would not be answerable for the consequences if a planned demonstration by opponents of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi went ahead.

However they seem to have been regarded as little more than typical Libyan bluster - with Britain's ambassador even placing a bet that nothing would come of it - despite repeated intelligence reports that weapons, explosives and "assassins" were being assembled at the People's Bureau.

Twenty five-year-old WPC Fletcher was killed on April 17 1984 when a gunman inside the bureau building in St James's Square opened fire with a submachine gun on the protesters and police outside.