Category Archives: Dag Hammarskjöld

UK and US accused of obstructing inquiry into 1961 death of UN chief

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Governments said to be ‘dragging their feet’ in handing over evidence relating to death of Dag Hammarskjöld

The US and UK have been accused by university researchers of obstructing a United Nations inquiry into the 1961 plane crash that killed the UN secretary general Dag Hammarskjöld.

A conference in London heard an update from the UN assistant secretary general for legal affairs, Stephen Mathias, on progress in the inquiry, which is seeking archive documentation from member states.

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South Africa may hold the answer to who murdered Olof Palme

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The trail for the killer of the Swedish prime minister had gone cold until a diplomat picked up the 1986 case as a hobby

Dag Hammarskjöld brought me to Olof Palme. Two Swedish leaders, both supporting small nations on the world scene, both of whom refused to be controlled by global superpowers; both died a violent death. Were they also victims of the same forces?

For 11 years I investigated the mysterious aeroplane crash that killed the former UN secretary-general Dag Hammarskjöld, a a project that became the subject of the documentary Cold Case Hammarskjöld.

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MI6 accused of thwarting effort to solve 1961 killing of UN chief

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Files on Dag Hammarskjöld plane crash are being withheld, says inquiry

MI6, the secret intelligence service, is under pressure to share its files on the mysterious death of a UN secretary general who was killed in an air crash almost 60 years ago.

Dag Hammarskjöld died with 13 others in September 1961, when his plane crashed near Ndola, in what was then Northern Rhodesia. There has been speculation that the plane was brought down deliberately. A film released this year, Cold Case Hammarskjöld, a winner at the 2019 Sundance film festival, has continued to stir interest.

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Coups and murder: the sinister world of apartheid’s secret mercenaries

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A South African militia that claimed to be behind the murder of a UN chief was involved in deadly work across the continent, its members say

Keith Maxwell, the self-declared “commodore” of the South African Institute for Maritime Research (SAIMR), liked to dress up on special occasions in the garish costume of a 18th-century admiral, with a three-cornered hat, brass buttons and a cutlass. Ordinary members of his organisation were expected to show up in crisp naval whites.

Gathered together in upmarket restaurants, or the quiet of the Wemmer Pan naval base in south-central Johannesburg, they had the air of eccentric history buffs. Maxwell talked about the group’s roots in a Napoleonic-era treasure-hunting syndicate, and told outsiders it was still focused on deep-sea exploration.

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Man accused of shooting down UN chief: ‘Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to…’

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Exclusive research reveals that a British-trained Belgian mercenary admitted the killing of Dag Hammarskjöld in 1961

Jan van Risseghem was only a teenager when his mother ordered him to flee Nazi-occupied Belgium for her native England with his brother Maurice. After hiding in a convent, and an epic journey across the war-torn continent, they reached safety in Portugal, then took a ship north.

Once in England, the pair signed up with the Belgian resistance, and with the help of an uncle enrolled for flight training with the RAF, a decision that shaped not just their war, but the rest of their lives.

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