In 1989, a plane was blown out of the sky by Libyan terrorists, killing all 171 people on board.

Wreckage was scattered over huge area, with photos showing the charred remains of passengers still strapped to their seats.

Oil worker Stuart Meredith had swapped tickets at the last minute to make a surprise visit on his wife and children. He never arrived.

This was not Lockerbie.

But the forgotten atrocity has been overshadowed by the seismic political implications of the tragedy over Scotland nine months earlier, according to Mr Meredith's widow Sue, whose wait for justice and compensation is only now at an end.

Mrs Meredith, of Hadlow Way, Lancing, lost her husband when the French UTA airliner, flight 772 from N'Djamena to Paris, crashed over the Niger desert on September 19, 1989.

Fourteen years later, Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi has signed an agreement which will lead to a payout settlement being reached next month.

She said: "The extra money will be a godsend to us but I can't buy back my husband."

Mr Meredith, who was 43, had only been working for the oil exploration company in Chad, Africa, for seven weeks when he decided to take leave and fly home a week early.

Mrs Meredith has struggled to cope in the years since the attack and said her loss had been aggravated by the sense of isolation she felt from the political and legal negotiations.

A French court convicted six Libyans, including Qaddafi's brother-in-law, in their absence for the bombing.

In 1999, Libya offered victims' families £30,000 each.

But France wanted to renegotiate the compensation after Libya agreed to pay families of the 270 victims of the 1988 Pan Am bombing a total of nearly £2 billion.

France repeatedly threatened to delay the lifting of sanctions imposed on Libya for Lockerbie if Libya refused to increase compensation.

She said: "It's always been Lockerbie. Our sympathies have always been with them but it's been hard because our tragedy has never really been mentioned since.

"You never see it on the news or hear about it.

"It's very hard to explain to people how we feel. You do feel hurt and angry at the time, obviously - it would be abnormal if you didn't want to hit out.

"I look at children who are 14 and I think 'My God - it's a whole lifetime ago for you that this happened.

"Now I've got four grandchildren. Lots has happened in 14 years, lots of losses and gains."

Mrs Meredith says she felt for the past 14 years like her husband's death had been ignored by the authorities.

She said: "We have never been able to contact any of the families. We have often asked if there was a body of people, as there is with Lockerbie.

"But because only four British boys were on that plane, we didn't have someone there to support us and we were never able to find out what was going on."

The new deal has cleared the way for sanctions to be lifted against Libya but Mrs Meredith says she is angry that her husband's murderers remain free.

She said: "As individuals, I don't think I'll ever be able to forgive them. I don't think you can forgive a terrorist."