LORD FRASER, the former lord advocate, has suggested that Dr Jim Swire, spokesman for the British relatives of the victims of the Lockerbie disaster, may be suffering from Stockholm syndrome.

The Conservative peer said Swire’s insistence that Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, the Libyan convicted of the 1988 bombing, was innocent was symptomatic of the condition in which hostages develop empathy for their captors.

On the eve of the 20th anniversary of the atrocity in which 270 people died, the former GP, whose daughter Flora was among the dead, has been accused of being “irrational” and “unstable” by relatives of American victims.

Remembrance events are planned for today on both sides of the Atlantic. In Lockerbie there will be a wreath-laying ceremony at Dryfesdale cemetery, where some of the 11 townspeople who died are buried. Evening services will be held at Tundergarth and Dryfesdale churches.

In America a ceremony will take place at the Lockerbie memorial at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington DC and a memorial service is planned at Syracuse University, New York state, which saw 35 of its students killed in the atrocity.

Yesterday Alex Salmond paid tribute to those who died in the bombing. “I offer my support to all involved in marking the anniversary and, in particular, my condolences to those who will be mourning the loss of a loved one,” Salmond said.

However, the anniversaryhas been overshadowed by a row involving Swire and those who believe that his support for Megrahi is unjustified.

Swire has said he believes the former Libyan agent is the victim of a miscarriage of justice and has visited him in jail to demonstrate his support.

Fraser, who served the indictment on Megrahi and his co-accused Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah who was subsequently cleared of involvement, said he felt Swire had become too closely involved in the case.

“Do you just lose your objectivity, which is what I understand Stockholm syndrome to be?” Fraser said. “That seems to have the hallmarks of it. He’s certainly got a very clear empathy for Libya — that seems to me strange.”

Fraser said he believed Swire’s conviction that Libya was not to blame was irrationally formed by the death of the adopted daughter of Muammar Gadaffi, the Libyan leader, in 1986, when American fighters bombed targets in Libya.

“I think Jim Swire was so affected by that, he came to the conclusion that if an adopted daughter was killed it could not have been them. I am slightly lost in the logical jump in that.”

Robert Monetti, spokesman for the American victims’ families, said: “I don’t see any rational explanation for his behaviour. Swire never has been a terribly stable person.”

Last night Swire said he was being targeted ahead of the ratification of a prison exchange treaty between Britain and Libya that he believes will pave the way for Megrahi’s transfer to Tripoli. “We are in a situation where active measures are being taken to discredit those who do not believe the official version,” he said.

“You have to remember that Monetti and people like him who say I am off the beam were not there through the trial like I was to listen to the evidence.”

Megrahi was found guilty after a trial by a specially convened Scottish court at Camp Zeist in Holland. He is appealing against his 27-year sentence after a ruling by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission that his 2001 conviction was unsafe.

Times Recommends

• Oh no, Mr Darling: you have failed
• BBC survives dogfight over Kennel Club expose
• Where the Rosetta belongs can’t be set in stone