Creator Of Terrorist Explosive Blows Self Up In Apparent Suicide

One of the creators of Semtex, the plastic explosive sought by international terrorists for its cruel efficiency, apparently blew himself up with explosives, a Czech news agency reported Monday.

Bohumil Sole, 63, died May 25 in a blast that destroyed the main bathhouse at the spa of Jesenik, the agency CTK said.

An examination of body parts collected at the blast site, about 120 miles east of the Czech capital of Prague, confirmed the victim’s identity, said CTK, quoting a police officer identified as Jiri Kysucan. Kysucan said Sole’s death was ruled a suicide.

Police said Sole had received treatment at the Jesenik spa for a psychological disorder.

In 1990, Sole acknowledged he had been a member of the team that created the explosive at Synthesia, a state-run company during the Soviet era.

Semtex was used in the bomb that exploded on Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988, killing 270 people.

The material also was used as a detonating charge in the bomb that exploded at New York’s World Trade Center in 1993, killing six people and wounding more than 1,000.

To prevent unauthorized use of Semtex, Synthesia, now a private company, recently announced it was working on a new version of the explosive that would lose its elasticity after a certain period of time.

In 1990, Czechoslovakian President Vaclav Havel said the country’s former communist rulers had sold 1,000 tons of Semtex to Libya.

“If you consider that it takes 7 ounces to blow up an aircraft, this means world terrorism has enough Semtex to last for 150 years.”