THE SUNDAY TIMES – Leading Article: It is three weeks since news emerged of the decision to allow the Lockerbie bomber to return to Libya to die, and the sense of unease is growing. Polls show that two-thirds of people in Britain, and a similar proportion in Scotland, where the decision was made, think the release of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi on compassionate grounds was wrong.
Legal and quasi-judicial decisions often spark outrage. Kenny MacAskill, Scotland’s justice secretary, had to defend his decision last week in the Scottish parliament. What has increased the sense of unease is the strong suspicion that the release was the direct result of deals done in the desert between Tony Blair and Colonel Muammar Gadaffi, the Libyan leader, deals subsequently refined by British government ministers.
Today we report on a letter written by Jack Straw, Britain’s justice secretary, to his Scottish counterpart in December 2007. In it he overturned a previous understanding that Mr Megrahi was exempt from a prisoner transfer programme agreed between Britain and Libya as part of the Blair-Gadaffi discussions. A few months earlier the government had been clear on that exemption. Lord Falconer, then lord chancellor, wrote to Alex Salmond, the leader of the Scottish National party, saying Libya had agreed that the Lockerbie bomber would serve out his sentence in Scotland.
What changed? The strong circumstantial evidence is that a lucrative agreement to allow BP to explore for oil off the Libyan coast was being held up by Mr Megrahi’s exemption from the prisoner transfer programme. The idea that the Westminster government had no view and no influence is not credible. >>> | Sunday, August 30, 2009
