AS the Lockerbie trial reached a landmark yesterday, with the closing of the Crown case, John F Kennedy's former press secretary proclaimed the innocence of the two Libyan accused and branded the proceedings a show trial. Mr Pierre Salinger demanded to be allowed to stay in the witness box and ''tell the truth'' but was told that although he could say what he liked outside, he had to abide by the court's rules. Since the trial began on May 3 this year, the special Scottish court sitting at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands has heard evidence over 72 days from 230 witnesses. Originally, the prosecution cited more than 1000 witnesses but large areas of evidence were agreed with the defence and drastically reduced the length of a case that some experts thought would run for 18 months. The defence have been given a week to prepare to lead their evidence but Mr William Taylor QC will ask the court for more time. Mr Salinger, ABC News's former chief foreign correspondent, claimed he knew who carried out the bombing - and was infuriated when the court refused to let him speak out. After the hearing, he blamed Palestinian terrorist organisation the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command. The same organisation is named in a special defence put forward by the two accused Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah at the start of the trial. They blame the PFLP-GC and the Palestinian Popular Struggle Front for the bombing. Mr Salinger spoke of the five-year investigation he carried out into the destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 which blew up over Lockerbie on December 21, 1988. He told PA News: ''It was the PFLP-GC . . . who did it and they carried it out for the Iranians.'' One of the theories surrounding the Lockerbie bombing is that the bombing was contracted out by the Iranians to another country in revenge for the American navy shooting down an Iranian airliner in the Gulf in the summer of 1988. Iranian religious leaders swore ''blood would rain down in revenge'' after all 290 people on the plane, many of them pilgrims on their way to Mecca, died. Mr Salinger said: ''I said to the lawyers today, let me go forward with the truth because I want to tell you who did it and it was not the two Libyans, but they wouldn't let me.'' Prosecutors say the accused planned the attack on Flight 103 to further the aims of the Libyan Intelligence Services. Excerpts of the Salinger interviews at the homes of the accused were shown to the trial yesterday. In the first, Mr Megrahi described in good English his career leading up to his posting in Malta and ridiculed suggestions he had links with the Libyan Intelligence Service. He admitted he had travelled to Zurich, where the prosecution alleges he acquired timers for use in the bomb. However, he insisted it was only in an attempt to form a business with a fellow Libyan. Salinger later dismissed the Lockerbie court hearing as a ''show trial'': ''I feel very badly that I was not allowed to tell my side of the story in court today. They should have allowed me more time to give my truth.''