Sunday 1 August 2010

Megrahi PTA was 'reward' for Libya’s WMD removal

[This is the headline over a long article published today on the Newsnet Scotland website. It reads in part:]

A former advisor to Tony Blair has claimed that the Prisoner Transfer Agreement (PTA) drafted by Blair and Col Gaddafi in the ‘deal in the desert’ was a 'reward' for Libya having given up its nuclear weapons.

The claim was made by John MacTernan who is a former special adviser to Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy and who was Tony Blair’s political secretary at the time of the secret deal.

Mr MacTernan denied that the PTA was related to the BP oil deal signed that same day saying: “The Prisoner Transfer Agreement was a deal, but it was a deal to recognise the fact that Gaddafi had given up his nuclear weapons.

“If the price for Libya giving up nuclear weapons was that Megrahi served his sentence and died in a Libyan jail the British government would have been happy with that”. (...)

[There follows a long account of UK and US dealings with Libya that culminated in the announcement that both countries were satisfied that Libya's nuclear weapons programme had been dismantled. The article continues:]

The claim by Mr MacTernan that the PTA was recognition by the UK of Libya’s removal of her WMDs may be partly true. However it seems unlikely that the UK government would offer the return to Libya of the UK’s most infamous mass murderer (victims mostly American) and seek nothing in return.

The question is though, is there anything that links Libya's abandonment of WMDs, the 'deal in the desert' and the signing of the BP oil contract?

Well yes, in the shape of another key player Sir Mark Allen.

Sir Mark was in charge of the Middle East and Africa department at MI6 until he left in 2004 to become an adviser to BP.

The former Oxford graduate is also the man credited with helping to persuade the Libyans to abandon their development of weapons of mass destruction in 2003.

It is known Sir Mark lobbied then justice secretary Jack Straw to speed up negotiations over the prisoner transfer agreement to avoid jeopardising a major trade deal with Libya. He made two phone calls to Mr Straw - who later let slip Sir Mark's involvement to a select committee.

Mr Straw said: "I knew Sir Mark from my time at the Foreign Office - he has an extensive knowledge of Libya and the Middle East and I thought he was worth listening to."

If Mr MacTernan’s ‘nuclear’ bombshell was an an attempt at diverting attention away from BP’s involvement in the deal in the desert it hasn't succeeded. It has served only to invite scrutiny of the UK, US, Libyan negotiations from December 2003 and draw attention to the very close diplomatic relations that were ongoing.

Far from separating the PTA from the BP contract, Mr MacTernan's statement seems to have drawn them closer together.

23 comments:

  1. At the risk of offending I have to say I take any contribution from the likes of John McTernan with a very large shovel-load of salt. He was an adviser in the past and nothing more. He was also part of the period in the UK where we were introduced to the politics of spin. Some of us are still recovering from how central a role spin was to play up to and including illegal-wars and the terrible consequences we are still living with and our soldiers are literally dying with.

    The same spinners would have us all move on from Iraq, from Afghanistan.........errr and trust them now when they say there was no jiggery-pokery involving Megrahi in the PTA. Dearie me.

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  2. Newsnet Scotland contains some brilliant articles there is no doubt but it pains me to see them clinging on to a priority that distracts from the bigger issues which are the original guilty verdict and the statement by the SCCRC that a miscarriage of justice could have occurred.

    I believe passionately that the SNP gets an appalling time from the Scottish Media. I write frequently to broadcasters and to newspapers berating them for the absolute failure to cover politics in Scotland impartially. The examples number many hundreds, perhaps even thousands. Newsnet Scotland highlights these things often too and so they should but in using the Megrahi affair as another issue where they seek only to defend the (SNP) Scottish Government they do, in my opinion, great harm.

    I see in this article another attempt to do the same. If only they could see that in seeking to blame all of it on "the Unionists" they alter the debate significantly and perhaps even switch people off. Ironically if the priority is to vindicate the SNP it would, in my opinion, help considerably if Newsnet Scotland actually used the miscarriage of justice positively. For if any Party would benefit from the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth emerging it is the SNP. I will never understand why Newsnet Scotland cannot see that or why they label those of us who, instead of harping on about the release, focus on the miscarriage of justice and the loss of the appeal as failing to understand the boundaries of the debate. It seems absurd. Those politicians who have attacked the SNP as a Party about Megrahi's release have a lot to hide which is why they don't focus on anything but the release and why they don't want to go back further. The SNP has nothing to hide whatsoever and nothing to fear either. They do, however, have a great deal to gain by continuing to call for a full investigation into Lockerbie, full stop. Kenny MacAskill has now done this: Mr Salmond has too. I would truly love to see Newsnet Scotland highlighting this because the statements by both are big statements.

    Kenneth Roy has contributed enough to their site justifying this approach. Are they simply not reading them?

    The trial, the verdict, the first (failed) appeal, the second application for appeal after which the SCCRC found those six grounds.......all of these things happened before the release and they are far more important.

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  3. This is not related to this thread but just a link in case Robert Black misses it in his daily update. Daily Express
    I would like to make it clear I do not read the Daily Express :)

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  4. Blogiston, here is what Peter Biddulph says in an e-mail to me about the Express story:

    One of your bloggers has referred you [to] today's Sunday Express article "Movie Plan for Lockerbie Life Story".

    There is no "movie plan". (...)

    I explained that our website invited writers and producers to look at our manuscript to see if it would be of interest.(...)

    I said that ... I could not understand why the media were not going crazy about the [Inspector Harry] Bell diary and its contents.(...)

    But that didn't help the Express. They went ahead with the original intention. All a bit over-egged. And no mention of the Bell diaries, even though they are in the public domain, and in the opinion of al-Megrahi, should be made public for all to see.

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  5. Please tell more about Inspector Bell's diaries! If they are in the public domain, where can they be accessed?

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  6. I think he probably means the extracts that feature in Megrahi's appeal documents, to be found on the Megrahi My Story website.

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  7. Mr McTernan´s first sentence is untrue:

    “The Prisoner Transfer Agreement was ...a deal to recognise the fact that Gaddafi had given up his nuclear weapons".

    Unless, that is, secrets contradict public information as to which nations in the world had nuclear weapons.

    It could be that

    a) Mr McTernan has made a mistake and meant to say "not-very-advanced weapons development programme", and

    b) the fact that he repeated the error is a coincidence,

    and

    c) the fact that it makes the deal look better for the UK is a coincidence.

    His other statement is, unless the unknown weapons really did exist, irrelevant to any real situation.

    He said,

    “If the price for Libya giving up nuclear weapons was that Megrahi served his sentence and died in a Libyan jail the British government would have been happy with that”.

    Another problem with the relevance of that sentence to the real world is:

    It refers to Mr Megrahi dying in jail. In 2007 - when Jack Straw decided not to exclude Mr Megrahi from the agreement - that was not anticipated as occurring within the next few British parliaments, let alone under a government which was currently happy with the prospect.

    Here again, the fact that his version, with death in jail as part of the deal, makes the UK look like they have paid a smaller price may be coincidence.

    Or he may just have made another mistake.

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  8. Correction to my last sentence!

    "He may ...."

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  9. Mr MacTernan's sentences are often untrue. He is a graduate from the University of Spin!

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  10. He also was a nothing in the last government or parliament and therefore anything he has to say is pretty irrelevant. He is best ignored in my opinion.

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  11. I think he probably means the extracts that feature in Megrahi's appeal documents, to be found on the Megrahi My Story website.

    Ah. I haven't read all of the longer documents there, though I have read some extracts. Clearly, I should spend some time on that.

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  12. I don't know why the media aren't going crazy over the whole thing. It's as if, the minute the appeal was dropped, someone flipped a switch on the journalists and they went into "Megrahi is guilty and nothing must be allowed to question that" mode.

    Something very strange going on here.

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  13. I don't think it is that simple Rolfe. Opposition politicians were the ones who went into "Megrahi is guilty." mode at Holyrood. They added, "The Nationalists released the Lockerbie Bomber." for good effect. The national media went with that. It is in the interests of all of those (even those who accuse Scotland of being carried by the rest of the UK) to hold the Nationalists responsible for the outrageous decision to free a "terrorist". It allows them to ignore the awful truths that both Tory and Labour governments since Thatcher have tried so hard to bury. Nothing strange about it. Well that isn't true actually. What is strange is that the media bought it!

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  14. Also, the truth about Megrahi, the doubts about his guilt, were around long before the release. More than two years at least. The SCCRC published its findings in 2007. Why did the media not go mad about THAT? Why did they allow the judiciary to delay as they did? Why did they not demand answers as a matter of urgency when people of the standing of Dr Kochler/Koechler were on record saying that the behaviour of our Judiciary was "scandalous and tantamount to
    an obstruction of justice"?

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  15. There was quite a lot in the media back then. Almost constant reporting about the PIIC document and the back-flips they were turning to avoid disclosing it, and speculation on what it was about. Some about the Gauci identification too.

    Now they all have amnesia.

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  16. Indeed, so think about that Rolfe because that alone astounds me on a daily basis. Why would the national media to the north and south of the UK just bury this? It beggars belief. They are, in my opinion, every bit as culpable as the politicians. They let it happen.

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  17. And on the issue of opposition politicians ignoring the elephant in the room (the possible miscarriage of justice) let's see what Richard Baker (Labour Shadow Justice Minister) had to say last week.

    "Mr Baker told BBC Radio Scotland's Good Morning Scotland: "It speaks volumes about the lack of confidence he has now in his own decision that he is running a mile from any scrutiny of it."

    Mr Baker argued it was "perfectly legitimate" for American politicians to ask Mr MacAskill to come to Washington and answer questions, saying the senators "represent so many of the families who lost loved ones" in the atrocity.

    The Labour MSP said: "The US senators want to know why Megrahi was released. Only one person can tell them that - that's Kenny MacAskill."

    He also called on Mr MacAskill to meet American families who lost loved ones when Pan Am flight 103 was brought down over Lockerbie.

    Mr Baker said: "I think it's time for him to go to meet them personally and not only to explain his decision, but now offer an apology for making such a bad decision, which clearly was very wrong.""

    My immediate observation there is here is a Labour Justice spokesperson actually upholding the right of the US to summon our Justice Minister to the US to discuss an issue over which the US has no jurisdiction whatsoever. He actually uses the word "legitimate" to describe the US position when even non-experts in the legal process (that would be me) know he is talking absolute nonsense and simply playing Party-politics of the most vomit-inducing type.

    It is essential to ask Mr Gray, his boss at Holyrood, to explain under what circumstances any Scottish Government headed by him would see itself accountable to the United States of America and to comment on his own Shadow Justice spokespersons position on the same issue. The same question should be addressed to Ms Goldie who made comments along the lines of Richard Baker's. Mind you, since her London boss has already labelled the entire UK a "junior partner" in the relationship with the US I shudder to think what she will come back with!

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  18. Part 1 of 3. Sorry. Long comment by Charles Norrie.

    Megrahi PTA was 'reward' for Libya’s WMD removal
    Sunday, 01 August 2010 08:11

    A former advisor to Tony Blair has claimed that the Prisoner Transfer Agreement (PTA) drafted by Blair and Col Gaddafi in the ‘deal in the desert’ was a 'reward' for Libya having given up its nuclear weapons.

    == I have not doubt this may be a fair reading of Mr Megrahi's predicament, but it hardly does anything to resolve the issue of why Mr. M was convicted, and more importantly, who did Lockerbie.

    The claim was made by John MacTernan who is a former special adviser to Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy and who was Tony Blair’s political secretary at the time of the secret deal.
     
    Mr MacTernan denied that the PTA was related to the BP oil deal signed that same day saying: “The Prisoner Transfer Agreement was a deal, but it was a deal to recognise the fact that Gaddafi had given up his nuclear weapons.

    == The BP oil deal being signed the same day as the PTA, the nuclear relations question and such interesting issues as the burying of the attempted assassination of a leading Saudi sheikh by Libyan secret service agents – the man had worked with President Mandela to secure the surrender of Mr Megrahi to trial at Zeist, and Libya was none too pleased when the US continued to maintain its own sanctions against the country (as distinct from UN sanctions) and may well have felt a desire to wreak some revenge. It was of course impossible to proceed against Mr Mandela, as he was in debt to the Libyan regime for its support through the ANC years, but had awarded Colonel G, persona;;y, the highest South African decoration – the Cape of Good Hope Medal.


     
    “If the price for Libya giving up nuclear weapons was that Megrahi served his sentence and died in a Libyan jail the British government would have been happy with that”.

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  19. part 2 of 3

    == Fair comment. But remember Mr M was only peripherally associated with the Libyan nuclear weapons programme in that he was simply a businessman doing his patriotic best for his country against what he and the regime must have felt were essentially illegal sanctions, whether imposed by the US, the UK or the UN.

    This sensational claim by Mr MacTernan was broadcast last week by the BBC on its Newsnight programme and opens up an entirely different angle into the former Labour leader's infamous deal in the desert.
    Last week after pressure from the Scottish Government, US authorities released a letter sent to Kenny MacAskill by a US state department official making clear that compassionate release of Mr Megrahi was “far preferable” than repatriation under the PTA.

    == I can't see why. The removal of Mr M from the equation that the secret of the destruction of Pan Am 103 might come out is sufficient enough.

    Statements from the US have given the impression that US authorities were completely unaware of the reason for Tony Blair’s 2007 ‘deal in the desert’.

    == Do you really believe that. The SD especially wanted the deal in the desrt for it would allow their own demonstrable complicity in the Lockerbie bombing to be swept further under the carpet. No-one has rationally analysed why so few US SD officials died in the crash, which should have been crowded with them at Cristmas-time.
    However, given the very close nature of the US/UK relationship in negotiating and overseeing the dismantling of Libya’s nuclear capability then these new ‘nuclear reward’ claims by a man who was one of Tony Blair’s most senior advisors at the time will call into question the USA’s insistence that it knew nothing of the PTA negotiated by Blair.

    == Yes

    The events leading up to the removal of Libya's WMD were set in motion in March 2003 when Libyan intelligence agents contacted the UK and explained that Libya was prepared to give up its weapons of mass destruction in order to rejoin the international community. There then followed 9 months of secret talks between the Libyan leader Col Gaddafi, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

    == In other words Libya wanted to return to its protected status vis-a-vis MI6. MI5 is entirely a different matter.
    On 19 December that same year Libya publicly declared and then renounced its clandestine nuclear weapons program.
    That day President George Bush said:

    “With ….
    President Bush promised that these steps would see benefits to Libya and an end to “old hostilities” saying:
    “As the Libyan government …

    == Ignore the hogwash from Bush.

    The UK and US administrations continued to work very closely...

    ==as they always do. The catspaw and the cat.

    The press release explained that Libya, the United Kingdom and the United States had established a Trilateral Steering and Cooperation Committee to discuss remaining issues.
    == In other words Libya would do anything the US and UK required.

    The State Department said of the committee: usual guff.
    By the beginning of 2005 the US had ended economic sanctions, allowed U.S. firms to negotiate contracts for their re-entry and upgraded their diplomatic relationship with Libya.
    Crucially the State Department briefing stated clearly that:

    “The United States and the United Kingdom did not offer specific promises or rewards to the Libyans.... The United States, the United Kingdom, and Libya have worked together as a team to eliminate Libya's WMD programs and to begin the process of improving relations between Washington and Tripoli.”

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  20. = Yes

    The events leading up to the removal of Libya's WMD were set in motion in March 2003 when Libyan intelligence agents contacted the UK and explained that Libya was prepared to give up its weapons of mass destruction in order to rejoin the international community. There then followed 9 months of secret talks between the Libyan leader Col Gaddafi, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

    == In other words Libya wanted to return to its protected status vis-a-vis MI6. MI5 is entirely a different matter.
    On 19 December that same year Libya publicly declared and then renounced its clandestine nuclear weapons program.
    That day President George Bush said:

    “With ….
    President Bush promised that these steps would see benefits to Libya and an end to “old hostilities” saying:
    “As the Libyan government …

    == Ignore the hogwash from Bush.

    The UK and US administrations continued to work very closely...

    ==as they always do. The catspaw and the cat.

    The press release explained that Libya, the United Kingdom and the United States had established a Trilateral Steering and Cooperation Committee to discuss remaining issues.
    == In other words Libya would do anything the US and UK required.

    The State Department said of the committee: usual guff.
    By the beginning of 2005 the US had ended economic sanctions, allowed U.S. firms to negotiate contracts for their re-entry and upgraded their diplomatic relationship with Libya.
    Crucially the State Department briefing stated clearly that:

    “The United States and the United Kingdom did not offer specific promises or rewards to the Libyans.... The United States, the United Kingdom, and Libya have worked together as a team to eliminate Libya's WMD programs and to begin the process of improving relations between Washington and Tripoli.”

    == Important point. The issue at stake was the the Libyan relation with the Americans, not the British. Was the UK the peacemaker between two fractious parties?
    This was underlined in another official US State Department document that again emphasised the close cooperation between the UK and the US:

    “It is also worth emphasizing how cooperatively we have been working with our British allies in this important project. From the very beginning -- in the secret Libyan discussions in 2003 -- the U.S. and UK have worked together very closely. The successes achieved to date stand as a testament to our two governments’ shared counter-proliferation goals and firm commitment to the Libyan elimination and verification effort. Our partnership in this project has been crucial to its success. 
    “The United States, the United Kingdom, and Libya have worked together as a team to eliminate Libya’s WMD programs and to normalize relations between Washington and Libya.”

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  21. == Important point. The issue at stake was the the Libyan relation with the Americans, not the British. Was the UK the peacemaker between two fractious parties?
    This was underlined in another official US State Department document that again emphasised the close cooperation between the UK and the US:

    “It is also worth emphasizing how cooperatively we have been working with our British allies in this important project. From the very beginning -- in the secret Libyan discussions in 2003 -- the U.S. and UK have worked together very closely. The successes achieved to date stand as a testament to our two governments’ shared counter-proliferation goals and firm commitment to the Libyan elimination and verification effort. Our partnership in this project has been crucial to its success. 
    “The United States, the United Kingdom, and Libya have worked together as a team to eliminate Libya’s WMD programs and to normalize relations between Washington and Libya.”

    == More hogwash

    By May 2006 the US had re-established full diplomatic ties with the Libyans, a new U.S. Liaison Office had been set up in Libya and a Libyan Interests Section was established in Washington to facilitate more extensive diplomatic relations.
    Given these newly forged US/Libya ties, it seems highly unlikely that the Libyans would have jeopardised their international rehabilitation and trade benefits by keeping a PTA deal involving Megrahi a secret from the US.  In actual fact it is reasonable to assume that such a deal would have been impossible to keep secret.

    == It is reasonable to suppose the US knew of the agreement all along, and not only that approved of it.

    It is also reasonable to assume that the US was not only aware of the negotiations between Gaddafi and Blair ..... but actually countenanced them.
    Something for nothing?

    The claim by Mr MacTernan that the PTA was recognition by the UK of Libya’s removal of her WMDs may be partly true. However it seems unlikely that the UK government would offer the return to Libya of the UK’s most infamous mass murderer (victims mostly American) and seek nothing in return.

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  22. And I would repeat, Mr McTernan was a nobody in Blair's administration. He really is then, not qualified, to make any announcements, sensational or otherwise on this, or in fact any other subject, although I note Newsnight Scotland has taken to parachuting him in to various political debates involving general Scottish affairs lately. Not sure why. He isn't elected. Perhaps it should disturb us just how important Spin Doctors were in previous Westminster Governments that our media still can't quite accept that they were basically just PR people and not officially appointed to do anything.

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  23. I would reject also any truth part or otherwise in MacTernan's claim that the PTA was Libya's reward for getting rid of WsMD. The PTA was about Megrahi, pure and simple. MacTernan like so many people associated with the Party who set up the PTA in the first place is out there basically to provide more distractions from the big issue, the truth.

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