But Mr Bollier's case has been taken up by Sir Teddy Taylor, Tory MP for Rochford and Southend East, who is convinced that the Libyans did not blow up Pan Am flight 103."I have heard very strong evidence that, while the Libyans may have done some bad things, they were not involved with this one," Sir Teddy said.. "For me this fragment is fabricated," he told them.Mr Bollier has asked for experts from the US and from a leading electronics company to examine the piece of circuit board to see if they agree with his analysis. "The whole story about this fragment is very mysterious and there is something unbelievable about it," he said yesterday.Mr Bollier's firm sold 20 MST-13 timers to the Libyan Armed Forces Secret Service between 1985 and 1986, and learnt that the sales could become part of the Lockerbie case in 1990. Mr Bollier and his partner confirmed from a photograph that they had sold the parts to Libya and repeatedly asked to examine them.Pan Am's insurers lodged a pounds 20m lawsuit against MEBO after learning that the firm had been linked to the bombing. But he told Scottish police when he examined it on 14 September that it had never been used in a bomb because it had not had electronic components soldered to it. The timer fragment, about the size of a thumbnail, is a central piece of forensic evidence against Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi and al-Amin Khalifa Fhimah, whose trial is due to start in just 10 weeks' time in Holland.Mr Bollier, a partner in a Zurich-based electronics firm called MEBO, said the piece of circuit board could have come from one of his timers.

His praise suggests that he still regards Mr Portillo as a future Tory leader.Lord Parkinson urged the former deputy prime minister Michael Heseltine to bow to Eurosceptics by standing down at the next election. And he said that the former chancellor Kenneth Clarke had "to acknowledge that he'll never come back as a great political figure".. His claims, if true, would undermine the case against the two Libyans accused of the terrorist act. The revelation will give a major headache to the prosecution in the case. Edwin Bollier, a Swiss businessman who sold timing devices to Libya, has told prosecutors that a tiny fragment found after the 1988 aircraft crash could not have been used in a bomb. A KEY witness has claimed that a crucial piece of evidence from the Lockerbie bombing is flawed.

Parliament doesn't have too many of them."He went on: "I think William Hague will make him chairman of the party and they'll make an excellent combination."His comments are significant because Lord Parkinson remains a leading figure amongst the party's Thatcherites. Even the most optimistic Tory MPs speak of securing a hung Parliament.Lord Parkinson, who won a landslide victory as party chairman in the 1983 election, told the Cambridge students he believed that Michael Portillo would be made Tory chairman after returning to the Commons in this month's by-election in Kensington and Chelsea.Heaping praise on Mr Portillo, Lord Parkinson described him as "very able, very bright, he has a coherent set of beliefs" "He was the best Defence Secretary we've had in many years He's an outstandingly capable person An excellent minister and debater, with joined-up politics. One insider said last night: "Everyone is talking about whether William will hang on as leader if we lose, and how well he would have to do to keep his job."Despite public declarations that the Tories can win the next election, some frontbench opposition spokesmen believe the best they can hope for is to cut Tony Blair's 177-strong majority to about 50. The former cabinet minister, who was brought back as party chairman when William Hague became Tory leader in 1997, predicted Labour would win a second term when he addressed the Cambridge Forum, a debating society at Cambridge University. His comments will embarrass the Tory leadership but reflect the private views of many senior figures in the party. This is one of the findings in Community Relations Work with Pre-School Children, by Dr Paul Connolly of the University of Ulster.Obstacles to peace, page 4Donald Macintyre, Review, page 3. LORD PARKINSON, the former Tory party chairman, has admitted that a Conservative victory at the next general election is "unlikely".

A first draft of a possible IRA statement was said to have been turned down by Unionist negotiators. The elements of a deal are said to hinge on such a statement, which would be made with other statements from the Unionist party, the British, Irish and American governments and the Decommissioning Commission, headed by the Canadian general John de Chastelain.There is also conjecture that the IRA would appoint an interlocutor to liaise with the general's commission.The difficulties are illustrated by a new book that shows that, by the age of two, many children are aware of categories such as Catholic, Protestant, RUC and IRA. This raised the question of how Mr Trimble might sell to his divided party any scheme which did not conform to its policy of "no guns, no government". It includes many who insist early decommissioning must take place, together with many who are opposed to the idea of a cross-community executive.Mr Trimble yesterday flitted between Stormont's Castle Buildings, where the negotiations take place, and the Stormont parliament buildings, where he met members of his assembly party. This was interpreted by some as an indication that he was preparing the way to announce a deal.But although expectations were high, most speculation centred on a series of phased steps which would see Unionists move towards forming a government while republicans moved in the direction of decommissioning.