Libya’s feting of Megrahi insults us all

[This is the headline over a column in today's edition of The Sunday Times by regular contributor, Gillian Bowditch. It reads in part:]

When it comes to the convicted Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the quality of mercy is looking very strained indeed. Far from dropping like the gentle rain from heaven, it has become a whirlwind which looks set to wreak havoc on the career of the Scottish justice secretary Kenny MacAskill.

The only man convicted of Britain’s worst terrorist atrocity, which led to the deaths of 270 people in 1988, was released on compassionate grounds last August on the basis that he was close to death. Doctors reportedly gave him three months to live.

Like just about everything else to do with the Lockerbie disaster, this has proved unreliable. Seven months on, Megrahi is still with us — a useful propaganda tool for a Libyan government and a potent symbol in the Middle East of Britain’s wholly inconsistent approach to terrorism. (...)

Megrahi is reputed to have become a national hero in his native land. Mothers are naming their newborn children after him and 30,000 well-wishers are said to have filed past his death bed in the manner of ghoulish medieval pilgrims. Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi’s son Saif, has said the convicted man is “in a good condition”. Treatment with the anti-cancer drug Taxotere is said to be prolonging his life and there is speculation he could live for years. (...)

With the exception of the families of the victims, nobody emerges from this saga well. The Scottish government has attempted to limp lamely onto the high moral ground, citing compassion as a reason for Megrahi’s release. But by allowing a single minister with only two years’ experience of government to take a unilateral decision on an issue which was of international importance, it has not only damaged relations with the US, it has appeared politically naive, inexperienced in international affairs and irresponsible.

It was not that long ago that the British government was portraying Gaddafi as an erratic and dangerous madman. So for the Scottish government to hand over a convicted terrorist to Gaddafi, without preconditions, defies belief. Far from the “three months to live” prognosis, based on the testimony of a single prison doctor and used by the government to justify its controversial decision at the time, Professor Karol Sikora, the cancer expert hired by the Libyan government, who saw Megrahi once, says his report stated that “on the balance of probabilities, there was a 50% chance he would die in three months”. (...)

The Scottish justice system has also been damaged by the debacle, with claims from a UN observer, among others, of a massive miscarriage of justice. Megrahi served eight-and-a-half years of his lifetime sentence handed down at a special hearing in the Netherlands. He chose not to give evidence in his own defence. He was in the middle of an appeal to clear his name at the time of his release, an appeal which had the potential to embarrass the British authorities and America’s FBI and which was dropped just before he was freed.

Had MacAskill had the best interests of Scottish justice in mind, he would have kept Megrahi in Scotland for the appeal. Had the chemotherapy offered to him there been given to him here, we would now be several months into the appeal and closer to the elusive truth. Unless the evidence is tested in a court of law, Megrahi’s protestations are worth little. A full-scale public inquiry would be costly. But justice has not been done nor has it been seen to be done.

The decision of the Scottish parliament’s justice committee last month to consider in private a revised draft report on the decision to free Megrahi, is symptomatic of a lack of transparency. If Megrahi is as well as Saif Gaddafi makes out, he should return to Scotland and clear his name properly. He has experienced mercy; it is time the dead and their relatives experienced real justice.