Minister visits Lockerbie bomber

[This is the headline over a report published on the BBC News website on this date in 2009. It reads as follows:]

Scotland's justice secretary has visited the Lockerbie bomber amid speculation he might be moved to Libya.

Kenny MacAskill met Abdelbasset Ali al-Megrahi in Greenock Prison as he considers a transfer request from the Libyan government.

The minister has already heard the views of others, including relatives of some of the 270 victims of the December 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103.

Terminally-ill Megrahi has also asked to be freed on compassionate grounds.

The transfer request was made by Libya to the UK government last May, less than a week after a treaty allowing prisoners to be transferred between the two countries was ratified.

Under the agreement, the country holding a prisoner should give its answer within 90 days.

Decisions about prisoners are the responsibility of the Scottish Government, in effect giving Mr MacAskill the final say.

Mr MacAskill said last week he would miss the 90-day deadline, which expired on 3 August, because he was waiting for more information.

No transfer can take place if criminal proceedings are active, meaning Megrahi would have to drop his latest appeal against his conviction in order to be sent home.

He was ordered to remain in prison for a minimum of 27 years having been found guilty of murdering 270 people in the bombing of Pan-Am Flight 103.

Mr MacAskill has embarked upon a series of consultations with interested parties, including relatives of American victims with whom he held a video conference.

While unusual for a minister to discuss a prisoner's case with him while he remains in jail, Mr MacAskill is understood to believe the visit is important to allow him to consider all of the facts.

Megrahi's legal team have also made a separate request for him to released from prison on compassionate grounds as he is suffering from terminal prostate cancer.

An earlier request, made in October 2008, was rejected by Appeal Court judges after they heard medical evidence that with adequate palliative care, Megrahi could live for several years.

The court heard that such requests are normally only granted where a prisoner has less than three months to live.

[RB: Following criticism directed towards Mr MacAskill for visiting Megrahi, I commented on this blog as follows:]

The visit by the Cabinet Secretary for Justice to Abdelbaset Megrahi became inevitable as soon as Mr MacAskill decided, presumably after taking advice from his officials, to take representations in person (and not just in writing) from interested persons, such as relatives of those killed on Pan Am 103. He could not, while complying with the requirement of procedural fairness incumbent upon him, offer the opportunity to make representations in person to categories of interested persons while denying that opportunity to the prisoner himself.

Are the politicians who have rushed to criticise Kenny MacAskill for meeting Abdelbaset Megrahi prepared to criticise him for meeting (in person in some cases, by video link in others) Lockerbie relatives? If not, their criticism is based on a misunderstanding of the legal position and reflects on them, not on Mr MacAskill.

[Abdelbaset Megrahi’s own account of this meeting (Megrahi: You are my Jury, page 354) reads as follows:]

… MacAskill visited me in Greenock Prison. It was a controversial decision which drew much criticism from the media and the relatives of the American victims. I reiterated what I’d said in my application and again emphasised my innocence. He was courteous throughout and gave the impression of being strong-minded yet gentle. Prior to the meeting I’d obtained a copy of his book Building a Nation, as I wanted to know more about his political views. He was no doubt surprised when I asked him to sign it, but he agreed to do so. I promised him jokingly that I would not run off and tell the media.

Cover-up, conspiracy and the Lockerbie bomb connection

[This is the headline over an article by Marcello Mega that was published in Scotland on Sunday on 19 February 2006:]

If there is a day when the seemingly inconsequential case involving DC Shirley McKie morphed into the crisis which today is threatening the reputation of Scotland's judicial and political system, it is Thursday, August 3, 2000.

It was already more than three years since McKie had visited a house in Kilmarnock where a woman called Marion Ross had been brutally murdered. Since then McKie had been accused of entering that house unauthorised, and leaving her fingerprint on the crime scene. She had been charged with perjury, after claiming in court she had never set foot in there. She had been humiliated at the hands of her former colleagues.

Now, on that August day, a group set up by the Association of Chief Police Officers Scotland (ACPOS) to examine the McKie case, was faced with a stunning report. It had already been established that the fingerprint experts at the Scottish Criminal Records Office (SCRO) had got it wrong and that the print was not McKie's. Now, the document in front of the group - an interim update from James Mackay, the man they had asked to investigate the case - claimed the SCRO officers had acted criminally to cover up their mistakes. The consequences were immense: if Scotland's forensic service was both guilty of errors and of attempting to conceal those errors, what confidence could anyone have in the entire justice system?

Last week, Scotland on Sunday revealed the contents of Mackay's final report, which had been kept secret for six years, and which was never acted upon by Scotland's chief prosecutor, Lord Advocate Colin Boyd. This week, we can reveal that it was not just police and prosecutors who knew its contents; the devastating findings of the interim version were passed on to ministers as well.

Mackay, a much respected former Deputy Chief Constable of Tayside police, had been commissioned to investigate the McKie case after a separate report by HM Inspectors of Constabulary had found that - despite the SCRO's claims - McKie's prints had never been at the crime scene. Mackay now probed deeper. As this newspaper revealed last week, his final report found that a mistake had been made, yet had not then been owned up to. "The fact that it was not so dealt with," he reported, "led to 'cover up' and criminality." (...)

On Friday, [Lord Advocate Colin Boyd QC] declared that he had seen the full Mackay report and decided that there was still insufficient evidence to prosecute anyone from the SCRO. This decision, taken in September 2001, astonished Mackay. He is understood to have expressed his "surprise" and "disappointment" to the Crown Office and to have relayed his concerns to the then deputy crown agent, Bill Gilchrist. Indeed, so curious is the Lord Advocate's decision not to prosecute, that many are reaching their own conclusions as to why he didn't press ahead with a prosecution.

One is the theory that such a prosecution would undermine the case against David Asbury, the man jailed for the murder of Marion Ross. Such a fear was misguided: Asbury's conviction was quashed anyway in August 2002 on the back of the McKie revelations.

A second theory brings in the shadow of the Lockerbie bombing. Mackay's explosive report into the McKie case that August came three months after Boyd began the prosecution of Libyan suspects Abdelbaset Al Megrahi and Al Amin Khalifa Fhimah. The eyes of the world were focused on Scottish justice. What would it have said of that system if - just as the Crown was trying to convict the bombers - it emerged that fingerprint officials had been involved in "criminality and cover-up"?

Boyd strenuously denies that Lockerbie has any relevance to his judgments regarding the McKie case. When Iain McKie first raised the issue in 2000, Crown Office officials declared that Lockerbie "had not affected in any way the response from this or indeed any other department of the Scottish Executive to the issues raised by you."

But there is clear proof that senior justice chiefs had a stake in both cases; SCRO director Harry Bell, for example - whose agency was coming under such scrutiny - was a central figure in the Lockerbie investigation, having been given the key role in the crucial Maltese wing of the investigation, and given evidence in court.

Today's revelation that two American fingerprint experts who savaged the SCRO over the McKie case were asked by the FBI to "back off" suggests that plenty of people were aware of the danger that the case could undermine the Lockerbie trial.

Former MP Tam Dalyell - who has long campaigned on the Lockerbie case -

said: "I have always felt that there was something deeply wrong with both the McKie case and the Lockerbie judgment. It is deeply dismaying for those of us who were believers in Scottish justice. The Crown Office regard the Lockerbie case as their flagship case and they will go to any lengths to defend their position."

The pressure for a full public inquiry is now growing day by day.

Background to prisoner transfer agreement

[What follows is excerpted from an article by Dr Ludwig de Braeckeleer that was published on the OhmyNews International website on this date in 2007:]

Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi, the son of Libya leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, told the French newspaper Le Monde that the six health workers, held in Libya for nearly a decade for allegedly having infected hundreds of children with HIV, have been released in exchange for the transfer to Libya of Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi. (...)

"We will soon have an extradition agreement with the UK. Our diplomats have discussed the matter with their British counterparts last month," Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi said.

Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi sought the interview, held on Tuesday in a luxurious hotel located in the French city of Nice, to "clarify a few issues." He told the French journalists that he never believed that the six Health workers were guilty. "Unfortunately, they were mere scapegoats," he stated calmly. (...)

The deal was initiated by the former Head of MI6 Global Operations, Marc Allan [sic; the person referred to is Sir Mark Allen], who arranged a series of meetings between Bulgarian and Libyan secret services agents.

[General Kirtcho] Kirov [head of Bulgarian secret services] met Moussa Koussa on five occasions in Tripoli, Roma, Paris and London. Koussa was the head of the Libyan secret services until 2004, when he was succeeded by Abdallah Sanoussi, the brother-in-law of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Kirov and Sanoussi pursued the negotiations over the last three years.

Last February, Saif Al-Islam, the sword of Islam, and Kirov held a secret night meeting in Vienna. The two men agreed on exchanging the six medics sentenced to death in Libya for Abdel Basset Ali Al-Megrahi.

"I knew that these issues would be solved by late July-early August," Kirov said. "Both affairs are indirectly linked to the geopolitical interests of the US, the UK and Libya." (...)

The agreement to swap the medics for Megrahi was finalized during Blair visit to Tripoli earlier this year. On June 28, less than a month after one of his last foreign travels as Prime Minister, the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission decided to grant Megrahi a second appeal and to refer his case to the High Court.

The revelation by Saif Al-Islam and the timing of the events are devastating for Blair and the credibility of the Crown’s independence. Tony Blair's official spokesman has always denied the allegations that Megrahi would be returned to Libya.

Asked about these allegations, which were reported by the BBC and Sky News, at the G8 summit, Mr Blair's spokesman told AFP: "It's wrong."

The statement from the prime minister's office was backed by the Foreign Office spokesman. "It's an MoU that is going to lead to the start of discussions on the whole gamut of legal issues, judicial issues," he told AFP.

“Given that, it is totally wrong to suggest that we have reached any agreement with the Libyan government in this case. The memorandum of understanding agreed with the Libyan government does not cover this case,” he added. [RB: The Memorandum of Understanding, of course, did cover -- and was understood by both sides to cover -- Abdelbaset Megrahi.]

"Incredibly it seems that we are being asked to believe that this concerns other Libyan nationals, but not Megrahi," said Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was killed in the bombing.

The content of the MoU, which was signed on May 29 during Blair visit to Tripoli, is not known. Nevertheless, Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond told the Scottish Parliament that the document "deals with judicial cooperation on matters of law, extradition, and on the issue of prisoner transfer".

"This government is determined that decisions on any individual case will continue to be made following the due process of Scots law," Salmond said.

"Tony Blair has quite simply ridden roughshod over devolution and treated with contempt Scotland's distinct and independent legal system," said Scottish Tory leader Annabel Goldie.

It has long been suspected that the US and the UK governments would do whatever necessary to avoid a re-trial of the Lockerbie bombing. If indeed Megrahi is returned to Libya, it is almost certain that the real culprits of the worst act of terror in the UK will never be identified, let alone convicted. Neither will we ever know why both governments have conspired to cover up the identities of these culprits.

The metallurgy of the circuit board fragment

[On this date in 1991 Allen Feraday of RARDE noted that tests had established that PT35b, the fragment of circuit board alleged to have come from the timer of the Lockerbie bomb, was metallurgically distinct from the circuit boards in MST-13 timers manufactured by MEBO Ltd. What follows is taken from an article on Jim Swire and Peter Biddulph’s website Lockerbietruth.com:]

Here are three photographs.

The first is of the fragment of timer circuit board said by the prosecution to have been found at Lockerbie.

Photographs two and three are of annotations written by Allen Feraday, the forensic officer on whose forensic report the Lockerbie verdict of Guilty was founded.

Photograph two is of his note dated 1st August 1991 concerning the above fragment. The words are "Plating on the two thin lines is of pure tin (Cu [copper] breaking through from underneath. Alan F.)"

The third is of his note on the same day concerning a set of circuit boards sent to him for comparison by the Swiss company Thuring. The words are "Tinning on the thin tracks is of 70/30 sn/pb [tin/lead]. However this may be dipped or roller tinned on top of either the Cu tracks? or the Cu tracks with a layer of pure tin? Alan F."

There is a clear metallurgical difference between the two items. Feraday indicates some puzzlement as to why this may be the case, hence his two question marks.

But did he draw this difference and his two questions to the attention of the judges in the Lockerbie trial?

No. He stated with absolute certainty:

“The particular tracking pattern of the fragment has been extensively compared with the control samples of the [Thuring] MST-13 timers and circuit boards and it has been conclusively established that the fragment materials and tracking pattern are similar in all respects to the area around the connection pad for the output relay of the `MST-13' timer.”

"Conclusively established ... materials and tracking pattern similar in all respects ..." Ten simple words. Yet on this false statement a man was condemned to a lifetime of imprisonment.  

What was the origin of the Lockerbie fragment? Who made it, where and when? It clearly did not come from Thuring and was not from the batch sold to Libya in 1985. Whatever its origin, it contradicts the unique central feature of the prosecution case.  

The Scottish Crown Office continues to stonewall the nation and Scottish Government by pronouncing that this evidence can only be considered in a court of law.  Well, here are the pictures. Please judge for yourself.

[RB: Further details can be found here (John Ashton) and here (Dr Morag Kerr).]

We had nothing to do with Lockerbie

[What follows is the text of a report headlined Return of Lockerbie bomber 'a priority' that was published in The Scotsman on this date in 2007:]

Saif al-Islam, the son of Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi, yesterday said securing the release of the Lockerbie bomber was more important to Libya than the return of £2.7 billion paid in compensation to victims families.

Islam, Col Gaddafi's most influential son, said he was confident Libya would be proved innocent of the 1988 terrorist attack, which claimed 270 lives.

Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi is currently serving a life sentence at Gateside Prison, Greenock.

Last month the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission ruled that Megrahi "may have suffered a miscarriage of justice" and referred the case back to the Court of Appeal. But an agreement signed between Tony Blair and Col Gaddafi in May could allow the ex-Libyan secret agent to complete his sentence in Libya - with the consent of Scottish ministers.

On a visit to France yesterday, Islam said: "The top of our priority is the return of Mr Megrahi and not the return of the money because he is more important than the money.

"We are confident one day it [will] be proved to the world we had nothing to do with Lockerbie."

US agent knows Lockerbie secret

[This is the headline over a report published in The Independent on this date in 1995. It reads as follows:]

Scotland's top law officer, the Lord Advocate, is to be asked to give diplomatic immunity to a disgraced American intelligence agent to uncover the part he claims the US played in the Lockerbie disaster.

The Labour MP Tam Dalyell, says the former agent, Lester Coleman, is willing to speak to Scottish police about an alleged security loophole set up by the US which resulted in a bomb being placed on Pan Am Flight 103 at Frankfurt airport.

The bomb exploded above Lockerbie after leaving London en route for the US on 21 December, 1988, killing all 259 people on board and 11 on the ground. Mr Coleman's theory of a connection between a drugs run from the Lebanon through Cyprus and Germany was the conclusion of a book about him by Donald Goddard, The Trail of the Octopus. The book is the subject of a libel action by another US agent.

Mr Coleman believes the bomb was able to be planted on the Pan Am flight because of an arrangement between US intelligence agents based in Beirut in 1988 and Lebanese terrorists. In exchange for information about Western hostages, the Americans agreed to facilitate a route for drugs from the Lebanon into the US.

Luggage containing drugs was protected by US intelligence with normal security restrictions on baggage at airports removed, allowing the bomb to be planted in a bag at Frankfurt.

Mr Coleman was indicted on charges of perjury and travelling on a false passport in 1993. He fled the US and is in hiding.

Mr Dalyell said he had written to the Lord Advocate asking him to bring Mr Coleman to the UK "on the promise of immunity from extradition to the US to talk to the police". He would not say where Mr Coleman was, adding: "The difficulty is that he is certainly threatened by US agents.

Sheriffs involved in the Lockerbie case

[What follows is excerpted from an article that was published in The Herald on this date in 1993:]

One of Scotland's most distinguished legal figures is retiring.

Sheriff Principal John Mowat, QC, of South Strathclyde, Dumfries and Galloway, will be succeeded by Sheriff Graham Cox, at present a Sheriff at Dundee.

The appointment of Sheriff Cox, 59, by the Queen on the recommendation of the Secretary of State for Scotland, will take effect from October 1, the Scottish Courts Administration said yesterday.

Among Mr Mowat's duties in recent years was the task of conducting the fatal accident inquiry into the Lockerbie disaster in which 270 people died.

During the £3m hearing he heard millions of words of evidence over a 61-day period.

He was born in Manchester 70 years ago and educated at Glasgow High School and Merchiston Castle School in Edinburgh before graduating at Glasgow University.

[RB: The Fatal Accident Inquiry into the 270 deaths resulting from the destruction of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie opened in Easterbrook Hall, Crichton Royal Hospital, Dumfries on 1 October 1990. The Sheriff Principal’s 47-page findings were issued on 18 March 1991 and can be read here. Perhaps the most noteworthy feature of the evidence related to the positioning of the bomb suitcase in luggage container AVE4041. By the time of the trial at Camp Zeist the Crown’s stance (and its evidence) had altered significantly. For further details, see Dr Morag Kerr’s Adequately Explained by Stupidity? Lockerbie, Luggage and Lies.

John Mowat’s successor as Sheriff Principal, Graham Cox QC, presided at Camp Zeist on 6 April 1999 at the first appearance of Megrahi and Fhimah before a Scottish court.

Abdelbaset Megrahi’s Scottish solicitor up to and including the first appeal, Alistair Duff, is now a sheriff and is currently Director of the Judicial Institute for Scotland. Norman McFadyen who was the procurator fiscal in charge of the Lockerbie case (and was one of the two members of the prosecution team who viewed the infamous CIA Giaka cables) is now a sheriff in Edinburgh.]

FBI and CIA rôles in Lockerbie investigation

[On this date in 2014 the Russian news agency RIA Novosti (now Sputnik International) published an article by Mark Hirst headlined FBI Chief Investigator Dismisses CIA Officer’s Claims Over 1988 Plane Bombing Intel. It reads as follows:]

An agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) who led the US probe into the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988 has denied claims made by a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)’s former officer who told RIA Novosti that FBI investigators did not read vital US intelligence material related to the attack.

Earlier Robert Baer, a retired CIA officer who was based in the Middle East, told RIA Novosti, “I’ve been having exchanges with the FBI investigators and they came right out and said they didn't read the intelligence."

“I just find that extraordinary and then later for them to comment on the intelligence and say it's no good; it’s amazing,” Baer said.

But Richard Marquise, who led the US investigation into the attack, dismissed Baer’s claim.

“Mr. Baer had no role in the investigation and anything he knows or claims to know is either hearsay or speculation,” Marquise told RIA Novosti.

“I find [Baer’s claims] interesting because he has previously said that the CIA did not pass us all the information, something I doubt he would be in a position to know,” Marquise argued.

“I agree that there were a handful of FBI personnel (agents and analysts) who had access to all the intelligence that was passed and it may have been possible that some FBI agents who played a minor role in the case may not have seen it,” he added.

For years controversy has surrounded the case following the 2001 conviction of Abdelbaset Megrahi, a former Libyan intelligence officer. Campaigners, including some relatives of victims of Pan Am 103, believe Megrahi was wrongly convicted and are continuing to call for a public inquiry into the events leading to the bombing.

Baer has previously claimed US intelligence pointed to Iran – not Libya – as the source of the attack that allegedly retaliated for the shooting down of Iran Air Flight 655 by the American warship, USS Vincennes, five months before the attack on Pan Am 103. Baer told RIA Novosti that a convincing case implicating Libya was still to be made.

“Richard Marquise has taken a moral position on the case,” Baer told RIA Novosti. “I can still be convinced the Libyans did it, but I still need to be convinced of that.”

Robert Black, Professor Emeritus of Scots Law at the University of Edinburgh, has spent more than two decades studying the case.

“I'd be absolutely amazed if the FBI didn't consider the intelligence material, if only to reject it as unreliable or unusable as evidence in judicial proceedings,” Black told RIA Novosti.

“Indeed, there's clear evidence that they did make use of it. A key prosecution witness, Majid Giaka, was a CIA asset and was in a Department of Justice witness protection program,” Black added.

“The FBI falls under the Department of Justice. And Giaka was a crucial witness in the Washington DC grand jury hearing that led to the US indictment against Megrahi and Fhimah,” Black said.

Pan Am Flight 103 was flying from Frankfurt to Detroit via London and New York City when it was blown out of the sky over Scotland by a terrorist bomb that killed 270 people, including 11 on the ground. A three-year-long investigation yielded two Libyan suspects who were handed over to the United [Kingdom] (...) in 1999. In 2003, Gaddafi (...) paid compensation, but said he had never given the order for the attack.

Concerns gleefully swept under the carpet

[What follows is an item that was originally posted on this blog on this date in 2009:]

The waiting game

This is the headline over my column in the July issue of the Scottish lawyers' magazine The Firm. It reads as follows:

It took three years for the SCCRC to conclude that Abdelbaset Ali Mohmad al- Megrahi may be the victim of a miscarriage of justice, and a further two years will have passed before his appeal is heard, by which time he may have died. Professor Robert Black QC calls on the Scottish authorities to show some courage before it is too late.

Abdelbaset al-Megrahi should never have been convicted for the Lockerbie atrocity. His conviction, on the evidence led at the trial, was nothing short of astonishing. It constitutes the worst miscarriage of justice perpetrated by a Scottish criminal court since the conviction of Oscar Slater in 1909.

It should never be forgotten that one crucial ground on which the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission held that there might have been a miscarriage of justice in Megrahi’s case, was its view that no reasonable court could have reached the conclusion that the trial court did, on a matter absolutely central to its reasons for convicting.

The delay in bringing Megrahi’s current appeal to the hearing stage has been scandalous. Had a modicum of urgency been shown, it is entirely conceivable that the appeal could have been over before now and the appellant back with his wife and children in his own country, a free man. The SCCRC had his case under consideration for more than three years before referring it back to the High Court. But the issue of the trial court’s unreasonable findings is a very simple and straightforward one and required virtually no investigation other than a perusal of the relevant portions of the transcript of evidence. If the SCCRC decided early in its deliberations that the case was going to have to be referred back on this ground – and it is difficult to believe that it did not – then delaying taking that step for three years is hard to justify.

Then there is the delay that has occurred after the SCCRC referred the case to the High Court in June 2007, attributable in large part to the Fabian tactics of the Crown and the spurious public interest immunity claims of the UK Foreign Office. Two whole years have passed since the SCCRC reference. Eighteen months have passed since the appellant’s full written grounds of appeal were lodged with the court. And it was only at the end of April 2009 that the first tranche of the appeal was heard. On the leisurely timetable that the appeal court has set, it would require a minor miracle for the proceedings to be concluded by the twenty-first anniversary of the disaster in December 2009.

What makes all of this worse is that the appellant was diagnosed in October 2008 with terminal, late-stage prostate cancer. His condition has recently deteriorated to such an extent that he was unable to attend court for the first tranche of the appeal or, indeed, comfortably to follow the proceedings over the TV link that had been set up.

The recently lodged prisoner transfer application would enable him to return to Libya to spend his remaining weeks with his wife, children, aged mother and siblings, which is – understandably – now his overriding priority. But, for prisoner transfer to be granted by the Scottish Government, Megrahi would have to abandon his appeal. This, clearly, would bring joy to the hearts of the Crown Office and the Scottish Government Justice Department. The manifold concerns over the Lockerbie conviction could be gleefully swept under the carpet and the pretence maintained that the system had worked perfectly and a guilty man had been justly convicted.

However, there is another course of action open to the Scottish Government, if Ministers have the strength of will and character to withstand the pressure of civil servants assiduously punting the prisoner transfer option. That course of action is compassionate release. This would enable Megrahi to be freed on licence and return to Libya. His appeal would run to its natural conclusion. If he died before the appeal court reached its decision, the appeal could be transferred to his executor or any person having a legitimate interest.

The Scottish public interest demands nothing less than that the concerns over Megrahi’s conviction be ventilated fully in court. Compassionate release provides the only mechanism whereby this can be achieved alongside the humanitarian goal of allowing him to die at home. Have Scottish Ministers the wisdom and the courage to embrace it?

[Compassionate release was indeed applied for and was ultimately granted by Kenny MacAskill. But he insisted -- quite wrongly -- on dealing with prisoner transfer and compassionate release concurrently, the consequence of which was that Megrahi had to abandon his appeal in order to satisfy the legal requirements for prisoner transfer: see Doomed from the outset.]  

Doomed from the outset

[On this date in 2010 a letter from Sir Brian Barder was published in The Guardian under the heading Vital point missed in Megrahi controversy. It reads as follows:]

In all the renewed controversy over the release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing ... a vital point seems to have been missed. Under the terms of the US-UK "initiative" under which Megrahi was convicted, he was required to serve his sentence in the UK. The initiative was accepted by Libya and approved by UN security council resolution 1192. For that reason Megrahi could never have been transferred to serve the rest of his sentence in Libya under the prisoner transfer agreement (PTA) negotiated by the Blair government with Libya, regardless of whether Megrahi was included in or excluded from its scope.

It's difficult to understand how the PTA came to be signed when it could never have been used to transfer Megrahi, the only Libyan then in UK custody. If BP was pressing for Megrahi to be transferred under the PTA, why was it not told that this was ruled out by the terms of the original agreement? Why didn't Alex Salmond and Kenny MacAskill point this out to Tony Blair and Jack Straw when they were arguing about the pros and cons of the PTA? Above all, when Blair and Straw made their "concession" to the Libyans under which Megrahi was not after all to be excluded from the PTA, did they remind the Libyans that Megrahi couldn't be transferred to Libya? If not, why not?

In an article published on Comment is Free on 1 September 2009, Oliver Miles pointed out that Megrahi's transfer to Libya under the PTA would have been contrary to the original agreement. It's strange that even then no one seems to have seen the implications of this.

[RB: The implications had, of course, already been seen on this blog: Britain accused of breaking promise to US over Abdel Baset Ali al-Megrahi and Foreign Office told Scotland it made no promises to US over how long Megrahi would stay in prison.

The reason why the "promise" was not taken seriously by the UK Foreign Office was that the only country that might have an interest in complaining if it was broken was the United States of America. And both the United Kingdom government and the Libyan government knew (because -- as Libyan officials informed me -- they had checked) that Washington was relaxed about Abdelbaset Megrahi's repatriation, though it would have to huff and puff for US public consumption when it happened.

When Kenny MacAskill rejected the application for prisoner transfer his principal reason for doing so was the undertaking contained in the “initiative” that led to the Zeist trial that, if convicted, the suspects would serve their sentence in the UK. Of course, if it had been accepted by the Libyan Government that transfer of Megrahi to a prison in Libya was simply not possible under the terms of the “initiative” (and I did my very best to convince them) no prisoner transfer application would have been made and, in consequence, abandonment of Megrahi’s appeal would not have been necessary when, later, his application for compassionate release was lodged. The prisoner transfer application may have been -- indeed, was -- doomed from the outset, but it served the interests of the United Kingdom and the United States very well by ensuring the abandonment of Megrahi’s appeal.]