The Lockerbie Case: Yet more on prisoner transfer

Friday 15 February 2008

Yet more on prisoner transfer

Both The Herald and The Scotsman follow up the story about prisoner transfer. Much is made of a letter by UK Justice Minister, Jack Straw, to Scotland's First Minister, Alex Salmond. In it, he stresses that the UK Government gave no undertakings to the Libyan Government about Abdelbaset Megrahi and confirms that the decision on repatriation, if Megrahi were to apply for it, would rest with the Scottish Government. But he goes on to remind the First Minister that any decision denying repatriation would be open to judicial review. Subtle, or what?

For Lucy Adams's article in The Herald, see
http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/news/display.var.2046568.0.Clash_over_Jack_Straws_secret_letter_on_Megrahi.php

and for that newspaper's editorial comment see
http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/editorial/display.var.2046488.0.Transfer_of_prisoners.php

And for some readers' letters on the subject, see
http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/letters/display.var.2046494.0.Families_of_Lockerbie_victims_have_a_right_to_be_informed.php

The Scotsman's coverage is at
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/latestnews/Straw-Lockerbie-bomber39s-fate-may.3781347.jp

I suggest that the terms of this letter supply further corroboration, if more were needed, that the negotiations with Libya were conducted with Megrahi very much in mind. The UK negotiators, however, were either (a) unaware that the ultimate decision on transfer of Megrahi rested with the Scottish Government or (b) were aware of this but deliberately concealed the fact from their Libyan counterparts, whom they knew to be concerned, above all, with the position of Megrahi. The fact that the Scottish Government was not informed that the negotiations were taking place might perhaps be construed as evidence supporting alternative (a). For my part, I am not at all sure that gross constitutional ignorance is all that much less of a sin in the UK Foreign Office than dishonest concealment.

For a somewhat different perspective from The Telegraph, an English newspaper, see
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/15/nlockerbie115.xml

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