US 'Warned Kenny MacAskill that Lockerbie Bomber Would Get Hero's Welcome'
TIMES ONLINE: Kenny MacAskill was warned by his US counterpart that the convicted Lockerbie bomber could get a hero’s welcome if he was returned home to Libya.

The message from Eric Holder, the US Attorney General, is contained in notes of a conversation he had with Mr MacAskill two months before the latter’s decision to free Abdel baset Ali al-megrahi [sic].

Theere was outrage in both the the US and in Britain last week when the freed terrorist was shown returning to Tripoli amid jubilant scenes with some in the crowd waving the Scottish flag.

The scenes came only hours after al-Megrahi, who is suffering from terminal prostate cancer, had walked free from Greenock Prison in Scotland after Mr MacAskill had granted him compassionate release.

Mr Holder’s warning has been revealed by Frank Duggan, the president of a relatives group, Victims of Pan Am Flight 103, the aircraft that was blown out of the sky over Lockerbie on December 21 1888, with the loss of 270 lives.

Mr Duggan says a US Justice Department official read him notes that Mr Holder used during the conversation with Mr MacAskill. >>> Angus Macleod, Scottish Political Correspondent | Friday, August 28, 2009

Lockerbie Bomber’s Private Jet to Freedom Courtesy of Gaddafi
TIMES ONLINE: Colonel Muammar Gaddafi will send his private jet to collect the Lockerbie bomber and take him home to Libya if, as expected, he is released from jail today on compassionate grounds.

Kenny MacAskill, the Scottish Justice Secretary, said that he would announce at 1pm his decision on whether Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi should be freed, but he gave no indication last night as to what that decision would be.

A luxury aircraft was scheduled to collect the bomber at Glasgow airport yesterday for his triumphant return to Tripoli, but the flight was cancelled at lunchtime because Mr MacAskill’s advisers were still locked in talks after intense diplomatic pressure from America to keep al-Megrahi in jail.

The prisoner, who is terminally ill with prostate cancer, called his wife, Aisha, from Greenock prison, saying that he was still uncertain about his fate. “He didn’t know when he will be released,” the mother of five told The Times. “He is happy [about the news] but he is very ill and waiting to find out what will happen to him.”

His mother said that he had called her and said that he hoped to be with her by Ramadan. Hajja Fatma, 95, told the Tripoli Post that she didn’t dare to close her front door: “I am expecting him to enter at any moment.” >>> David Brown, Charlene Sweeney and Richard Kerbaj | Thursday, August 20, 2009