World Notes WEST GERMANY

Recriminations keep dogging the tragedy of Pan Am Flight 103, which blew up last December over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270. Britain's Ministry of Transport came under fire for having failed to respond soon enough to terrorist bomb threats against U.S. airliners. Last week West German officials were embarrassed by charges that Bonn may have fumbled a chance to prevent the bomb from being smuggled onto the plane.

The West German weekly Stern charged that Marwan Khreesat, a Jordanian expert in barometric explosives, was arrested in West Germany six weeks before the Lockerbie disaster, along with 15 other suspected terrorists. Fourteen, including Khreesat, were released for lack of evidence. Stern said it had learned that Khreesat had been recruited as an informant for West German intelligence, implying that was the reason he was let go. Though American officials have reportedly confirmed the story, the Bonn government flatly denied it.