TIMES ONLINE: Lockerbie was a plot against American lives. Of course the US has every right to be outraged by the bomber’s release
Yesterday the Bishop of Musselburgh somehow tricked his way into the Scottish Parliament in the guise of Kenny MacAskill, the Scottish Justice Secretary. How else to account for the transcendent moral tone of the statement made concerning the release of the convicted bomber of Pan Am Flight 103?
Scotland was, the Right Rev MacAskill implied, a superior place where “we define ourselves by our humanity”, a humanity obliging the Justice Secretary to show compassion to Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi, in the form of letting him fly home, the occasion being the supposed proximity of the prisoner’s death.
And nothing else, note. The utterly unrepentant al-Megrahi, according to Mr MacAskill, who had by now switched to high sanctimony, was facing a “sentence imposed by another power ... He is going to die.” The word “soon” was of course implied.
So these are the new “laws and values of Scotland” — if you’re going to snuff it within a reasonably short time (let’s say months, or a year or so) you are thought to have been transferred into the custody of God and you get let out. How could one not agree with that?
Easily. One wonders how widely Mr MacAskill would like to see this form of humanity applied. Let us imagine that Robert Black, the Scottish serial killer of young girls, or Ian Brady, the Scottish-born Moors Murderer, were discovered to be on their last knockings. Like al-Megrahi, they, too, have shown a resilience in their refusal to help the authorities to uncover the full extent of their crimes, and have thus made matters worse for the victims’ families.
But surely they will soon be beyond the capacity to inflict harm, their maker’s finger beckoning to them, so wouldn’t it be best to return them from England to Grangemouth and Glasgow respectively, to die in the bosom of whatever families they can discover there? >>> David Aaronovitch | Tuesday, August 25, 2009
