assurances. It was not until May 2009 that researchers accidentally
discovered Kurras’s 17-volume MfS dossier and brought the case to
light, causing much public consternation. See also MEYER, TILL.– L –
LA BELLE DISCOTHEQUE BOMBING. The site of a notorious
terrorist attack during the Cold War, the La Belle Discotheque was
located in the Schöneberg district of West Berlin. Because of the large
number of U.S. military personnel among its regular patrons, officials at
Libya’s embassy (or People’s Bureau) in East Berlin, acting on orders
from Tripoli, selected the club as a target in retaliation for the American
sinking of two Libyan ships in the Mediterranean. Two of the individu-
als involved— Ali and Verene Chanaa—were German citizens who
had been working as informers in West Berlin for the Ministerium für
Staatssicherheit since 1982. Verene Chanaa transported the bomb to
the discotheque in a travel bag and activated the time fuse. When it ex-
ploded in the early morning of 5 April 1986, two U.S. servicemen and
a Turkish woman were killed and more than 200 others injured.
Telex incepts by the United States from the East Berlin mis-
sion confirmed Libyan involvement and led to President Ronald
Reagan’s decision to bomb Tripoli 10 days later. In 2001, a Berlin
court ruled that the Libyan secret service was responsible for the act
and sentenced the Chanaas along with Yasser Chraidi (a Palestinian
accredited to the Libyan mission) and Musbah Eter (a member of the
Libyan ministry of propaganda) to prison terms ranging from 12 to
14 years. Germany’s highest court upheld the verdict in 2004, the
same year that the Libyan government agreed to pay $35 million in
restitution. Evidence from the MfS’s files emerged during the trial
that confirmed the crucial logistical support provided to the terrorists
by Main Division 22 (Terrorism Defense). See also MAISON DE
FRANCE; MYKONOS; WIEGAND, RAINER.
LAHOUSEN, ERWIN (1897–1955). An Abwehr officer involved in
the anti-Nazi resistance, Erwin Lahousen was born in Vienna on 25
October 1897, the son of an Austrian field marshal. Lahousen served
in the infantry during World War I and secured a position in the
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