The Scottish police - The Crown Office - The payouts

[This is the headline over an article by John Ashton published this afternoon in a special edition of the Scottish Review.  It reads in part:]

The Scottish Government does not doubt the safety of the conviction of Mr Al-Megrahi. Their words, not mine. Their exact words in fact. That, as it happens, is also the position of the lord advocate. You wouldn't think that Megrahi's trial court judgement was described as incomprehensible by the UN trial observer and unreasonable by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC), and that numerous informed commentators consider the guilty verdict to be an indelible stain on the reputation of Scotland's judiciary.

Of course, an SNP government will never easily admit that the country's foremost independent institution, its criminal justice system, made an almighty hash of Europe's biggest terrorist case. However, if it continues to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Crown Office, Lockerbie will one day rear up and bite it very hard. Why? Because, as Megrahi: You Are My Jury lays bare, the Crown Office failed to disclose to Megrahi's lawyers, numerous major items of exculpatory evidence. This has the potential to be the biggest scandal of Scotland's post-devolution era. (...)

There were two key witnesses. The first was [Maltese] shopkeeper Tony Gauci, who on three occasions picked out Megrahi as resembling the clothes purchaser: the first, three years after the bombing from a photospread; the second, in 1999 from an ID parade; and the third time in court. The second was forensic expert Allen Feraday, who said that a fragment of circuit board found within a blast-damaged Maltese shirt was 'similar in all respects' to circuit boards used within the 20 Libyan timers.
     
In their 80-page opinion, the trial court judges, Lords Sutherland, Coulsfield and Maclean described Gauci as a 'careful witness' who: 'applied his mind carefully to the problem of identification whenever he was shown photographs, and did not just pick someone out at random…From his general demeanour and his approach to the difficult problem of identification, we formed the view that when he picked out the first accused at the identification parade and in court, he was doing so not just because it was comparatively easy to do so but because he genuinely felt that he was correct in picking him out as having a close resemblance to the purchaser'.

What the judges didn't know, because the Crown failed to disclose it, was that before picking out Megrahi's photo Gauci had asked the police about being rewarded for his evidence. According to previously secret police reports, he was 'aware of the US reward monies which have been reported in the press' and was strongly under the influence of his brother Paul who 'has a clear desire to gain financial benefit from the position he and his brother are in relative to the case' and 'is anxious to establish what advantage he can gain from the Scottish police'.

The Crown also concealed the fact that, for months prior to the ID parade, Gauci had a copy of a magazine article that not only carried a photo of Megrahi, but also detailed inconsistencies between the Crown case and Gauci's police statements – inconsistencies that his subsequent court testimony went some way towards ironing out.

The judges accepted that Gauci sold the clothes on 7 December 1988, the only date upon which Megrahi could have bought them. What they didn't know, again because the Crown failed to disclose it, was that, in his pre-trial Crown precognition statement, Gauci said that he thought the date was 29 November, because he recalled rowing with his girlfriend that day. Had that evidence been adduced at trial, the judges would have had no choice but to acquit Megrahi.

After the trial the Dumfries and Galloway police sought massive rewards for the Gauci brothers from the US Department of Justice. In a letter to the DoJ, dated 19 April 2002, the senior investigating officer wrote: 'At the meeting on 9 April, I proposed that $2 million should be paid to Anthony Gauci and $1 million to his brother Paul. These figures were based on my understanding that $2 million was the maximum payable to a single individual by the rewards programme. However, following further informal discussions I was encouraged to learn that those responsible for making the final decision retain a large degree of flexibility to increase this figure.’ 

It has never been denied that the brothers received at least $2 million and $1 million. The letter revealed that, at the request of a US official, the senior investigating officer had consulted with the Crown Office about the reward. He reported: 'The prosecution in Scotland cannot become involved in such an application. It would therefore be improper for the Crown Office to offer a view on the application, although they fully recognise the importance of the evidence of Tony and Paul Gauci to the case'. In other words, the Crown Office was prevented by its own rules from seeking a reward, but apparently had no intention of preventing the police from doing so.
     
All this, and more, was uncovered by the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission during its four-year review of Megrahi's case, following which it referred the conviction back to the appeal court on no fewer than six grounds. Small wonder that the Scottish Government, which claims that it wants the commission's 800-page report to be published, is using legislative ruses to delay publication.

Unfortunately, the Commission failed to properly investigate Feraday's claim about the Lockerbie circuit board fragment. As my book reveals, had it done so, it would have learned that there was forensic evidence that proved the fragment could not have originated from one of the timers supplied to Libya. Tests overseen by Feraday demonstrated that the metallic content of the fragment was different to that of a control sample circuit board of the type used in the Libyan timers. The results were not disclosed to Megrahi's legal team until a month before his return to Libya. Police labels indicated that they had been handed to the police on 8 November 1999, six months before the opening of Megrahi's trial.

All these issues would have been aired in the High Court during Megrahi's second appeal. The Crown Office was no doubt hugely relieved when he abandoned the appeal in order to smooth his application for compassionate release. However, the relief will only be temporary. The scandal will not go away and as the depth of the cover-up is laid bare, sooner or later the government will be forced to distance itself from the Crown Office and abandon the fiction that Megrahi's conviction is safe.

[In an accompanying sidebar, Scottish Review editor Kenneth Roy makes the following comment:]

We knew that Gauci – a witness so convincing that he was later described by Scotland's lord advocate of the time as 'an apple short of a picnic' – had been paid by the US Department of Justice. There were rumours, too, about his brother Paul, who was motivated by a desire for financial gain but otherwise not directly connected to the events in Malta in December 1988.      What we did not know until today was the extent to which the Scottish authorities were involved.      In this special edition, John Ashton quotes from a letter written by the senior investigating officer in Scotland making plain the police's desire not only to reward the Gauci brothers but to seek the biggest bucks available.

• There is no doubting the authenticity of this letter. Ashton has a copy of it.
• There is also no doubting that without Gauci there was no case: Megrahi would have walked free. 
• Where do these revelations leave the reputation of Scottish justice? 
• Is this really the way we want to conduct our justice system?

Lockerbie and the pursuit of truth

[This is the headline over the first leader in today’s edition of The Herald.  It reads as follows:]

The conviction of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi for the bombing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, killing 270 people, causes considerable unease among all who care about Scottish justice.

The authorised biography of Megrahi by John Ashton, a researcher for the defence team, brings together a number of claims that have already raised doubts about the handling of the case.

His allegation that Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill personally urged Megrahi, through a private conversation with the Libyan foreign minister, to drop his appeal to assist his release on compassionate grounds, although denied, will re-ignite speculation that the Scottish Government was keen to prevent the appeal being heard. Megrahi was not required to drop the appeal for release on compassionate grounds. That he did so avoided considerable embarrassment for the Scottish justice system.

A number of allegations made by Mr Ashton potentially undermine the safety of the conviction. A key one is that a fragment of circuit board did not match boards linking the timer used to detonate the Lockerbie bomb with Megrahi. It is equally alarming, and already known, that Tony Gauci, the key witness for the Crown who testified Megrahi had bought clothes found near the bomb in his shop, had been offered a reward by the US Justice Department. Such tainted evidence would normally be inadmissible.

Also, the claim that Iran funded the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - General Command to carry out the bombing in retaliation for the American warship the USS Vincennes shooting down an Iranian passenger jet and killing all 300 people on board in 1988 is not new. But it, too, bears further scrutiny.

It is known that a number of documents were withheld from the defence, a practice no longer tenable following successful challenges in the Supreme Court. The most shocking evidential omission, however, concerned the break-in at Heathrow close to baggage to be loaded on to the flight the night before the bombing.

The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) had already found six grounds on which Megrahi's conviction was potentially unsafe. Permission had been granted to publish the SCCRC's statement of grounds for appeal but this has not happened because the appeal was dropped. Whatever embarrassment would be caused by publication of the Commission's findings, the Scottish Government, which has already said it would publish, should recognise that this case has already called into question the quality of Scottish justice and that now is the time to release the document in the interests of justice.

For the families of those who died, the latest claims reinforce the cruel reality that, 23 years after that fateful night in December 1988, the investigation of the bombing remains unfinished business. Some of the relatives, most notably Dr Jim Swire, have shown extraordinary courage and tenacity in slowly gathering information about evidence not brought before the court. They deserve all the known facts to be brought together and examined in a public arena. Regardless of the difficulties in compelling witnesses to give evidence, an independent public inquiry remains the best hope of uncovering the truth.

The Times on the Megrahi biography revelations

[Like most of today’s print media (with the conspicuous exception of STV News's report) The Times’s main Megrahi story (behind the paywall) There was a deal, insists Lockerbie bomber, deals with the allegation that Kenny MacAskill, via Abdel Ati al-Obeidi, communicated that it would improve Megrahi's chances of repatriation if he dropped his appeal. Another report adverts in addition to some of the evidential issues raised in Megrahi: You are my Jury. It reads in part:]

Then, just eight weeks after the SNP came to power, the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission granted al-Megrahi leave to appeal, identifying six grounds for believing that a “miscarriage of justice may have occurred”.

The prospect of an appeal heaped pressure on the Scottish Government. By November 2007, Cabinet Office papers appear to show that Mr MacAskill was ready to include al-Megrahi in a prisoner transfer agreement between the UK Government and Libya, in exchange for concessions from Westminster over firearms legislation and slopping out in prison, where prisoners use pots in their cells for human waste.

According to minuted discussions, Mr MacAskill talked to Jack Straw, then Secretary of State for Justice, about the possibility of a deal. “There was then a conversation when (MacAskill) asked for a deal. He obviously spoke to Salmond,” Mr Straw told The Times last year.

The Scottish Government has angrily denied that it was ready to trade al-Megrahi in late 2007, but has been unable to produce its own minute of the crucial discussions that took place on December 19.

In 2009, al-Megrahi’s decision to drop his appeal spared the Scottish Government the potential embarrassment of an acquittal. With a grim irony, it is the British relatives of the victims of the bombing, such as Dr Swire, who are likely to campaign for a public inquiry into al-Megrahi’s conviction, after his death.

Yesterday, Mr Ashton said that the case of al-Megrahi showed Scottish justice in “a very bad light”, and warned the Scottish Government that it risked being dragged “into a huge scandal”. He added: “They (the SNP) has now to stand up and distance themselves from the Crown Office because there is so much that the Crown Office has withheld in this case.”

Mr Ashton said the most compelling piece of new evidence related to a tiny fragment of circuit board, believed to have been from the bomb’s timer. The Crown argued that the circuit board was one of many sold to the Libyan Government by Mebo, a Swiss company. It was found in the remains of a shirt collar, which in turn led to a shop in Malta, owned by Tony Gauci. Though his evidence too is contested, Mr Gauci identified al-Megrahi as the man who bought the clothing contained in the bag that held the bomb.

According to Mr Ashton, the timer was the “golden thread” in the prosecution case, but it was broken. He said that forensic analysis showed that the circuit board was coated in pure tin, and not in a tin-lead alloy, the only kind supplied by Mebo.

Independent scientists, consulted by the Crown, had noticed the difference but maintained that the tin fragment and the tin-lead amalgam were “similar in all respects”.

Worse, said Mr Ashton, the scientists conducted tests that proved that a tin-lead coating would not have been changed to pure tin by the force of a bomb’s explosion.

It was a “mighty scandal”, said Mr Ashton, that the results of the tests were not disclosed by the Crown before the trial at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands and were only passed to alMegrahi’s lawyers a month before he left prison.

In December last year, Frank Mulholland, the Lord Advocate, said: “The trial court held that . . . Megrahi did not act alone. This is a live enquiry and Scottish police and prosecutors will continue to pursue the evidence.”

A Crown Office spokesman said that the evidence against al-Megrahi had been rigorously tested at his trial.

“In light of his abandonment of his appeal, the conviction for the murder of 270 people and the judicial determination of his guilt stand,” he added. “The only appropriate forum for the determination of guilt or innocence is the criminal court.”

Detectives are expected to visit Libya soon as part of the continuing Crown Office investigation into the bombing.

[An opinion piece by The Times’s Scotland editor, Magnus Linklater, contains the following:]

If al-Megrahi was so seriously ill, why was he not given the treatment in a Scottish hospital that he immediately received on his return to Libya? Why has the Scottish Government never published the medical advice they were given? Why did they incur the wrath of world opinion in order to allow a convicted terrorist to go home? And was al-Megrahi’s decision to drop his appeal one of the conditions under which he was granted release?

It is this last question that is now under scrutiny. The conspiracy theory says that the Government was anxious to avoid an appeal because it might have revealed the unthinkable: that the highest-profile prosecution ever mounted in a Scottish court was based on unsafe evidence, and that a succession of judges and Lords Advocate connived in covering it up.

Like all conspiracy theories, that takes some believing. But now that it has been put forward, a denial from the Scottish Government is not, in itself, enough. There are too many unanswered questions. We now know that, long before his final illness, in December 2007, Mr MacAskill was exploring, with Foreign Office officials, ways of releasing al-Megrahi under the Prisoner Transfer Treaty.

So, release was in the air then, and speculation is rife now. Three things are needed to dispel it: first, Mr MacAskill must publish the medical evidence; second, he must disclose the full extent of his contacts with Libyan and UK officials; and finally he must deliver on the promised legislation which would enable full disclosure of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, on which al-Megrahi’s appeal was allowed to go forward.

Only openness will dispel the accusations. By allowing them to fester, Mr MacAskill is damaging his government and his reputation.

Lockerbie documentary demolishes Maltese key witness’s testimony

[This is the headline over a report published today on the website of Malta Today.  It reads in part:]

A documentary screened on BBC Scotland and Al Jazeera has seriously questioned the veracity of the testimony of Maltese shopkeeper Tony Gauci, the key witness who identified the Libyan man accused of the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing over the Scottish town of Lockerbie on 21 December, 1988.

Filmed in Malta and Scotland, the documentary coincided with the publication of John Ashton's Megrahi: You Are My Jury, published on Monday, which has alleged that the Crown Office, the Scottish police and UK defence ministry scientists failed to disclose numerous pieces of evidence that damaged their case against Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, 59.

The documentary delivered a devastating judgment of the testimony of Tony Gauci, the key witness who secured Megrahi's conviction by identifying him as the man who bought the clothes from his shop Mary's House. The fragments of the clothes were later found wrapped around the bomb fragments among the debris of the aircraft, and traced back to Malta.

Gauci's initial description and the resulting police drawing of the man who came to buy the clothes was found to be nothing like the pale-skinned Megrahi: Gauci's man was six-foot tall, had a big chest and large head, and his hair was very black.

But glaring discrepancies exist in the dates Gauci gave of the alleged visit of Megrahi. He first told police investigators the purchaser came on the 29 November because the Christmas lights had not yet been switched on in Tower Road, Sliema.

Then he claimed Megrahi came to the shop on 7 December, pointing out that as he left he opened a black umbrella he had just purchased - and later found among the Lockerbie debris - because it started to rain.

But the documentary consulted former chief meteorologist Major Joseph Mifsud, who said there was no rain on 7 December, 1988 between 5pm and 7pm - disputing Gauci's claim that Megrahi left as it started to rain.

And former Nationalist minister for tourism Michael Refalo turned out to be a surprising witness: he switched on the Christmas lights on 6 December, 1988 at 6pm, a fact proven by his own diary entry for the day. And this fact alone puts into serious doubt Gauci's claim that Megrahi must have purchased the clothes on 7 December.

Megrahi's conviction for the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing went for a second appeal after the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission found key aspects of Gauci's testimony seriously undermined the prosecution's request. Before the retrial, now suffering from cancer, Megrahi was released on compassionate grounds in August 2009 by the Scottish justice minister, and flown back to Libya.

Gauci was found to have met Scottish detectives as many as 50 times while the prosecution's case was being prepared, making 23 formal statements. He repeatedly changed his account, including identifying people who looked like known Middle Eastern terrorists.

The SSCRC said that by the time Gauci picked out Megrahi in an identification parade in 1999, a decade after the bombing, he had already seen Megrahi's face in an edition of Focus Magazine, and felt this may have been a miscarriage of justice.

The documentary also insisted that Gauci and his brother Paul may have been paid up to USD3 million by the US Department of Justice to uphold their version of events and the identification of Megrahi. No substantial evidence was presented in the documentary of this claim.

Megrahi forgives Gauci

The documentary featured Megrahi, visibly approaching the end of his life, "forgiving" Tony Gauci.

"Forgiving him, I am facing my God very soon," Megrahi says. "I swear I have never been in his shop or buy any clothing from his shop. I swear with my God, which is my God and his God as well, I swear I have never been in his shop or buy any clothing from his shop.

"He has to believe this, because when we meet together before the God, I want him to know that before I die. This is the truth."

Asked by his interviewer what he would say to Tony Gauci if he were in the room, he says: "I'd say he dealt with me very wrongly. I have never seen him in my life before he came to the court. But I do forgive him."

Bomb timer evidence

Documents given to Megrahi's defence lawyers a month before he dropped his appeal show that government scientists had found significant differences between a bomb timer fragment allegedly found after the attack and the type supplied to Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's former regime.

The evidence, published by Megrahi defence lawyer John Ashton, shows that scientists at the Royal Armament Research and Development Establishment, discovered there were key differences in the metal coatings used in a timer fragment allegedly used in Lockerbie and a control sample from the type supplied to the Libyans. One used a coating made wholly of tin; the control sample used a tin/lead alloy. [RB: Is it defamatory to describe a lay person as a lawyer? Perhaps John Ashton should consult a solicitor.]

And evidence also shows that the timer fragment had several differences from the Swiss-built devices sold to Gaddafi's regime, including the type of circuit board it used.

Book disputes prosecution's theory

Ashton's book states that if the prosecution was right, Megrahi - a member of the Libyan secret service stationed at Luqa as an employee of the Libyan Arab Airlines - carried out the attack using his own passport, stayed in his regular hotel at the Holiday Inn in Tigné, bought the clothes in a small shop rather than a large one, used normal scheduled flights to and from Malta, planted the bomb on two feeder flights before Pan Am 103, and used a timer the Libyans believed was exclusively made for them. [RB: If Megrahi was a member of the Libyan secret service -- and the only evidence of this came from the witness Addul Majid Giaka whom the judges found wholly incredible on every other issue -- there was not a scintilla of evidence that he was stationed in Malta.]

Megrahi book raises new questions over Lockerbie

[This is the headline over an article by Lucy Adams, chief reporter, in today’s edition of The Herald.  It reads as follows:]

"This book," said Reverend John Mosey, who lost his 19-year-old daughter in the Lockerbie bombing, "is the tipping point."

The book, Megrahi: You Are My Jury, raises many questions about the investigation and conviction of Libyan Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi. It covers a range of information in detail and draws on eight key areas.

1. The allegation

It is claimed pressure was applied to Megrahi to drop his appeal in August 2009 in order to return home. In the book Megrahi says it was a "terrible" decision to make but he felt he had no choice.

Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill refuted Megrahi's claims again yesterday. [RB: Kenny did not refute the claims: he denied them.]

2. The timer fragment

At the Camp Zeist trial, it was agreed a fragment of circuit board found at the Lockerbie crash site came from an MST-13 board manufactured by Swiss company Mebo and Thuring. Mebo revealed it had sold 20 such timers to the Libyans and this became a significant part of the case against Megrahi. However, the book claims the fragment found at Lockerbie was covered in 100% tin, while the timers sent to Libya were made from an alloy of tin and lead. It is alleged the Crown failed to disclose this discrepancy.

3. The Iranian connection

Megrahi says he does not want to "point the finger of blame at anyone else", but much of the material drawn together will lead readers to believe Iran funded the PFLP-GC [Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command] to carry out the bombing, in retaliation for the USS Vincennes shooting down an Iranian passenger jet and killing all 300 people on board in 1988.

The initial investigation into Lockerbie in 1989 all pointed towards the culpability of a German cell of the PFLP-GC. There is much within the book, including a statement by bomb-maker Marwen Khreesat which appears to confirm this view. Much of the evidence incriminating the PFLPC-GC was not disclosed at the trial or appeal.

4. Reward money and the reliability of witnesses

The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) was concerned that Tony Gauci – the Crown witness who said he saw Megrahi buy clothes which were later identified as having been near the bomb – was offered a reward by the US Justice Department. We now know his witness statements were more inconsistent than previously disclosed. The book also reveals that Edwin Bollier, who ran Mebo and testified against Megrahi, was very interested in "the reward money".

5. Undisclosed evidence

The SCCRC unearthed statements, police reports and other documents which had never been shared with the defence team. Part of the reason the case was referred back for a fresh appeal was the non-disclosure of evidence. Two of the documents still remain a secret because the UK Government claims publicising them would be a threat to national security.

Since the trial, Scots law has been challenged at the Supreme Court and the policy of non-disclosure has been changed.

6. Forensics anomalies

The forensics case against Megrahi was critical. The book reveals anomalies, contradictions, and arguments between police, the forensics team, the CIA, and the FBI. It claims information was withheld by the CIA and says anomalies later found in the forensic evidence from the Ministry of Defence Royal Armaments Research and Development Establishment "cast doubt on the overall reliability" of some of the forensics reports.

Other items were not contained within the forensics reports, including a small piece of circuit board from a radio cassette bomb found in a car belonging to Hafez Dalkamoni, of the PFLPC-GC, in Germany – something the defence team only learned about years later.

7. The Bedford suitcase

The Crown claimed forensic analysis of the Pan Am jet's fuselage showed the suitcase containing the bomb was in the second layer of luggage – indicating it had come from a feeder flight, rather than Heathrow.

However, the defence's review of the evidence focused on a brown suitcase seen by Heathrow baggage loader John Bedford before the Frankfurt feeder flight arrived. The trial judges described Mr Bedford as a "clear and impressive witness" but said there were many items of luggage not dealt with in detail in the evidence.

A police document, not disclosed to the defence, suggests the Bedford suitcase could have been the primary suitcase.

Subsequent to the trial and appeal, evidence emerged of a break-in at Heathrow the night before the bombing. Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was killed in the tragedy, has campaigned for a full inquiry into that break-in.

8. Why Megrahi used a coded passport when in Malta

The Crown has always made much of Megrahi's use in Malta of a false passport under the name Abdusamad. Chapter 2 of the book, entitled Before the Nightmare, explains Megrahi's work importing embargoed cars, soap, cigarette lighters and aviation parts. He says it was government practice to issue coded passports to those involved in importing embargoed goods.

Lockerbie bombing: We need an objective Holyrood inquiry

[This is the headline over an article by Dr Jim Swire in today’s edition of The Scotsman. It reads as follows:]

What we have heard in the last 24 hours is further, extremely significant scientific evidence. It appears to show that the evidence found in the third quarter of 1989 – the circuit board fragment – was not consistent with the digital timer that the prosecution alleged to have been used.

That timer was crucial to the prosecution case.

However, at the heart of this case is this extraordinary coincidence:

We know that Heathrow was broken into 16 hours before the explosion over Lockerbie. That break-in occurred in Terminal Three close to where Pan Am flight 103 would be boarded up with suitcases.

Whoever broke in may have left a bomb. It’s speculation, but it is entirely feasible.

Nothing is known about it, because it was not investigated.

We also know that people working for Ahmed Jibril, a Palestinian who broke away from most other Palestinian groups, had manufactured timers that could be triggered by flying above a certain altitude for three-quarters of an hour.

The Lockerbie bomb exploded 40 minutes after it left the terminal at Heathrow.

That bomb could not have been flown by Mr al-Megrahi from Frankfurt, let alone Malta, as it would have exploded en route.

All of this leads me to believe that Mr al-Megrahi was not the Lockerbie bomber.

I saw him in December and he is a very sick man. He finds it difficult to speak, but he is clear in his own mind.

What I would like to see now is an objective inquiry that I can trust, and that must be by the Scottish Government.

Have a look at the facts, have a look at the evidence, and come to a conclusion.

This can be done in this country, in Scotland.

Many pieces of evidence now point to the Crown Office having withheld things that should have been disclosed.

[The same newspaper contains an opinion piece (in my view, distinctly odd), by former Chief Inspector of Prisons, Clive Fairweather.  It reads in part:]

When Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi and his co-accused were in Kamp van Zeist, I met with both in the process of examining the conditions they were being held in.

This afforded me an additional opportunity to attend large parts of the trial where, as a former soldier trained to handle explosives and familiar with barometric timing devices, I was particularly fascinated by the compelling evidence given by a Swiss arms dealer working for Mebo. [RB: Whatever else he may have been, Edwin Bollier was not an arms dealer.]

He was closely questioned about tiny electronic circuit boards supplied to the Stasi and to the Libyan intelligence services, describing how each was slightly different in its components.

The variations were clearly depicted on the court television screens, one of which was traced, step by step, from Libya via Malta to luggage from the wrecked Flight 103. [RB: Colonel Fairweather is mistaken. There was no such evidence led at Zeist.]

This left me convinced of strong (though not necessarily sole) Libyan involvement.

It also became clear that al-Megrahi was a high-ranking intelligence officer and almost certainly “head of station” in Malta. [RB: Colonel Fairweather is once again mistaken. Megrahi was never stationed in Malta in the course of his career and there was certainly no evidence that he was Libyan intelligence’s head of station there.]

This was consistent with the highly cultured individual I found him to be during our exchanges.

His involvement in the baggage transfer arrangements and the explosive device, as proven by Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary, therefore seems conclusive. [RB: Colonel Fairweather’s certainty on this matter should be contrasted with the trial court’s caution and its recognition that the evidence relating to how the fatal suitcase was ingested at Luqa Airport was very weak.]

But I now believe he may have been mistakenly identified by the Maltese shopkeeper, Tony Gauci, and as he continues to vehemently insist.

No high-ranking intelligence officer would have exposed himself in such an indiscreet way.

My suspicions are that, instead, it may have been a Palestinian who made the purchases later found amongst the debris at Lockerbie.

So, guilty as charged, but some subsequent doubts remain on the line-up evidence.

[Also in today's edition of The Scotsman is a long and useful article headlined Lockerbie bombing: forensic expert's crucial test results 'were not made available to the court'.]

MacAskill under pressure over Megrahi appeal claim

[This is the headline over a report by Lucy Adams in today’s edition of The Herald.  It reads as follows:]

Scotland's Justice Secretary is under pressure to explain claims he advised the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing to drop his appeal against conviction to smooth the way for his compassionate release.

The allegation levelled against Kenny MacAskill – and denied by the Scottish Government – is contained in a new book, entitled Megrahi: You Are My Jury, in which Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi says he was "the innocent victim of dirty politics, a flawed investigation and judicial folly". It also makes claims about new evidence it says could have cleared the Libyan, but which the Crown Office failed to disclose to the defence.

Mr MacAskill is claimed to have made the offer to Megrahi through a Libyan official.

Scottish LibDem leader Willie Rennie called for Mr MacAskill and Lord Advocate Frank Mulholland to make a statement to Holyrood. He said: "Allegations of suppression of evidence and a Greenock Prison release deal between the Justice Secretary and Megrahi make it essential for a statement to be made to Parliament - it is important the Justice Secretary answers serious questions."

Tory leader Ruth Davidson said: "This is a staggering claim and implies the Scottish Justice Minister was offering legal advice to help a convicted killer escape prison."

Scottish Labour's justice spokesman, Lewis Macdonald, said Mr MacAskill may have "knowingly misled Parliament".

The new book details previously unseen evidence not disclosed to the defence, including forensics reports that suggest the fragment of circuit board found in the Lockerbie debris did not match those sold to the Libyans – as per the prosecution case at trial.

The book claims that the metal content did not match – but reports referring to this were not shared with the defence until 2009.

Megrahi dropped his appeal shortly before Mr MacAskill said he would be released on "compassionate grounds" on August 20, 2009. The book states that Mr MacAskill met Libyan officials, including Foreign Minister Abdulati al Obeidi, 10 days earlier.

Megrahi claimed: "After the meeting, the Libyan delegation came to the prison to visit me. Obeidi said that, towards the end of the meeting, MacAskill had asked to speak to him in private.

"Once the others had withdrawn, he stated that MacAskill gave him to understand that it would be easier to grant compassionate release if I dropped my appeal.

"He said he was not demanding that I do so, but the message seemed to me clear.

"I was legally entitled to continue the appeal, but I could not risk doing so."

Mr MacAskill has categorically denied the claim. A Scottish Government spokesman branded the book, as "third-hand hearsay".

The spokesman added: "These claims are wrong – and officials were present at all meetings the Justice Secretary had on this matter at all times. The minutes of this meeting and indeed all other meetings, including with Mr Megrahi in Greenock Prison, were published by the Scottish Government and have been in the public domain since September 2009.

"We can say categorically that neither did the Scottish Government have any involvement of any kind in Mr Megrahi dropping his appeal, or indeed any interest in it. That was entirely a matter for Mr Megrahi and his legal team."

The Crown Office said the decision was taken by Megrahi and his lawyers.

The book's author, John Ashton, who spent three years as a researcher with Megrahi's legal team, described the Crown's failure to disclose key information as a "scandal".

Professor Robert Black, one of the architects of the original trial, said the book appeared to have "put the final nail in the coffin of the conviction."

Prime Minister David Cameron described the book as "an insult to the families of the 270 people who were murdered".

[In today's edition of the Daily Express there is another report on this issue.]

"...the evidence against him has collapsed and the Crown had all of that..."

[The following are excerpts from an article published today in the UK edition of The Huffington Post:]

Less than 12 hours after [John] Ashton published his book on Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, opposition leaders were calling for a debate in the Scottish parliament based on its revelations and its publication had already been condemned by the prime minister as an "insult".

For Ashton, however, the claim that Scottish justice secretary Kenny MacAskill had indicated to a Libyan delegation Megrahi would be "more likely" to be released on compassionate grounds from prison if he dropped an appeal against his conviction is not the most important revelation in his book, entitled Megrahi: You Are My Jury.

For him, the real scandal is he believes Megrahi is innocent - and he thinks he has the evidence to prove it.

"It's Britain's worst mass murder and the real terrorist has got away with it," he told The Huffington Post UK on Monday.

As for MacAskill's alleged message, which has prompted the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to call for a debate in the Scottish parliament, Ashton says Megrahi was "very clear" that MacAskill was not "making a demand" the appeal should be dropped.

In his book Ashton claims there is new forensic evidence which shows the timing device used in the Lockerbie bomb was not from Libya, alleging evidence withheld by the Scottish crown office. "There's not one element of his case that hangs together," he says. (…)

Speaking of Megrahi now, he claims there was "nothing in his demeanour" which suggested he was responsible for the 1988 terror attack which killed 270 people.

"How many mass murderers if they were let out of prison would spend their final days writing a book about why they were innocent? He can tell his family and they will believe him that he didn't do it but why go the extra mile?" he asks."I only met him in these dire circumstances. He was very dignified in the way he conducted himself, he is a very devout Muslim but not a fundamentalist and he was very much a family man."

The furore about Megrahi's release from prison on compassionate grounds based on his cancer is, he says, "borne of ignorance".

"None of the political parties in Scotland or indeed in England will indeed look at the evidence. They're all playing petty games. The scandal is the evidence against him has collapsed and the Crown had all of that. That's the scandal."

So what does he want? "I want the book to force the Scottish government to call an inquiry," he says. "Everybody should be jumping up and down about this. The book is based primarily on evidence that the police gathered and the crown gathered. It's not things that I am claiming. I was working on the legal team and it was disclosed to us."

The book's publishers Birlinn have said Megrahi will not receive "financial profit" from the book. MD Hugh Andrew said in a statement on Monday: "Any person charged with a criminal offence has the right to defend himself. This is the first time that Abdelaset Al-Megrahi has given that defence. As a publisher we make no judgement as to the rights or wrong of that defence."

The Prime Minister speaks

[This is the heading over an item posted by John Ashton this evening on the Megrahi: You are my Jury blog. It reads as follows:]

A number of press reports of the book launch, such as this one, on the Daily Record’s website, carry the following quote by the Prime Minister:

“This is yet another reminder that Alex Salmond’s government’s decision to free the UK’s greatest mass murderer was wrong. Writing a book three years after he was released is an insult to the families of the 270 people who were murdered.”

As well as being factually inaccurate – Abdelbaset didn’t write the book, I did – the statement begs a huge question: how can Cameron possibly comment upon a book that he hasn’t read? If he did read it, he would learn that Abdelbaset was convicted on shaky evidence; that the Crown failed to disclose many items of exculpatory evidence from the defence; that the real Lockerbie bombers evaded capture; and that the Libyan people endured 12 years of UN sanctions on the basis of evidence that ranged from shaky to concocted. Of course, those are things that he would rather not know, because they expose the hypocrisy and vacuity of his position on Lockerbie. Maybe I should send him a copy (I assume he can read, after all, he had an excellent education).