With the substitution of Megrahi for Dreyfus, Scotland for
France, and the office of First Minister for that of President of the French
Republic, every word can with equal justice be addressed to Alex Salmond. The
magnitude of the Scottish miscarriage of justice and the flaws in the
investigation, prosecution and adjudication that led to it have been exposed in
the SCCRC’s Statement
of Reasons published by The Herald;
in John Ashton’s book Megrahi: You are my Jury ;
in David Wolchover’s monograph Culprits of Lockerbie;
and in Dr M G Kerr’s article An overview of the
Lockerbie case. There is now no shred
of justification for continuing to maintain that all is for the best in the
best of all criminal justice systems or -- the coward’s fallback position -- that,
while there may have been a few technical, procedural defects in his trial and
conviction, Megrahi was clearly guilty anyway, so what does it matter?
Zola’s letter was headed “J’accuse”. Although the Lockerbie investigation,
prosecution and conviction occurred under UK Conservative and Labour administrations,
it is Mr Salmond and the Scottish Government that today have the power to put
right the disgraceful miscarriage of justice that occurred on the watch of two
of their political opponents; and it is accordingly the Scottish SNP Government
that today stands accused. The only
honourable course of action open to that government is to institute an
independent inquiry under the Inquiries Act 2005 into the performance of the
Scottish criminal justice system in the Megrahi case, as a matter which has
caused grave public concern.
[I am grateful to Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer, author of the encyclopaedic 174-part Lockerbie series Diary of a Vengeance Foretold, for drawing my attention to an article entitled The Dreyfus Affair: Enduring CI Lessons published in the March 2011 issue (vol 55, no 1) of the journal Studies in Intelligence.]
[I am grateful to Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer, author of the encyclopaedic 174-part Lockerbie series Diary of a Vengeance Foretold, for drawing my attention to an article entitled The Dreyfus Affair: Enduring CI Lessons published in the March 2011 issue (vol 55, no 1) of the journal Studies in Intelligence.]
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