Thatcher comes to son’s rescue

From combined dispatches

LONDON

Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher has agreed to post bail equivalent to $300,000 to free her son, Mark, from house arrest in South Africa, the Times of London reported yesterday.

Mark Thatcher, 51, a millionaire businessman, was arrested in Cape Town, South Africa, last week on suspicion of helping finance a coup attempt in oil-rich Equatorial Guinea. He denied the accusation.

The Times said Mrs. Thatcher, 78, who served as prime minister from 1979 to 1990, agreed Friday to help her son after a telephone conversation on her return to Britain from a vacation in the United States. “The money will be paid within 36 hours,” The Times said yesterday.

Mrs. Thatcher, known as “the Iron Lady” when her Conservative Party was in power, has made no public comment on her son’s situation.

Mr. Thatcher was arrested and charged Aug. 25 with contributing money to a plan to overthrow Equatorial Guinean President Teodoro Obiang Nguema, who seized power 25 years ago in a coup.

Mr. Obiang says the plot was backed by foreign financiers who hoped to gain control of Equatorial Guinea’s vast oil wealth. He has accused London-based Lebanese oil tycoon Ely Calil and Mr. Thatcher of financing the coup plan.

Mr. Calil has denied involvement.

Mr. Thatcher has been under house arrest at his Cape Town home since then and faces his next court appearance on Nov. 25.

His attorney in Cape Town, Ron Wheeldon, said the $300,000 to obtain Mr. Thatcher’s release from house arrest was “a surety,” not bail.

The sum is equivalent to the amount Mr. Thatcher is said to have paid Simon Mann, the reputed British mastermind of the coup plot.

On Friday, Mann, the founder of the mercenary firm Executive Outcomes, was convicted in Zimbabwe of attempting to buy weapons illegally for the plotters. He faces up to 10 years in prison when sentences are handed down Sept. 10.

The trial in Malabo of 19 men — eight purported South African mercenaries , six Armenians and five men from Equatorial Guinea — began Aug. 23 and was suspended Tuesday.

Reuters news agency reported yesterday from Malabo, Equatorial Guinea’s capital on the island of Bioko off the coast of West Africa, that the trial would resume in 30 days, giving investigators time to visit South Africa and interview Mr. Thatcher.

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