Wikileaks vindicates Scotland on Megrahi release

 
The Scottish government should demand a full apology from Labour over its lies, smears and subterfuge around release of the man convicted of the Lockerbie Bombing.

The US Embassy Cables released through Wikileaks offer further proof that the UK government was desperate for Megrahi to be released. The cables also claims that while the Scots were "offered treats" they turned them all down. On Radio Four today Alex Salmond said he had never even used the term treats, but said the cables showed the SNP government were the only party to "play with a straight bat"  This is also confirmed in the cables by the gulf state of Qatar which lobbied for release on humanitarian grounds.

Alex Massie has blogged on it here at The Spectator. He is not a cheeleader for the SNP, but he understands this subject. Many other journalists skim the surface, failing  to understand that any links the British government made with oil deals were noting to do with the Scottish decision. Our government had already refused to co-operate with a British prisoner transfer deal negotiated with oil in mind. Whether the decision was right or wrong, (I was uncomfortable with it at the time) it was made independently by the Scottish justice minister for humanitarian reasons.

Both the UK Labour government and the current Tory Liberal Democrat are desperate for Libyan trade - which makes a mockery of their condemnation of the Scots. If they feel so strongly about Megrahi the convicted murderer, why are they still feting Gaddafi, the man who must have commanded him to plant the bomb 

Here is the story in The Guardian.

"The British government's deep fears that Libya would take "harsh and immediate" action against UK interests if the convicted Lockerbie bomber died in a Scottish prison are revealed in secret US embassy cables that show London's full support for the early release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.

Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, made explicit and "thuggish" threats to halt all trade deals with Britain and harass embassy staff if Megrahi remained in jail, the cables show. At the same time "a parade of treats" was offered by Libya to the Scottish devolved administration if it agreed to let him go, though the cable says they were turned down."

Comments

[Mark Hirst]

Joan writes; "Our prosecution service is independent of government, thank goodness." - when the incitements were made against Megrahi by Lord Advocate Peter Fraser, as head of the Crown Office and our prosecution service his post WAS a direct political appointment as were all appointments to that post up to 2007 (covering the period of the trial and 1st appeal). The SNP Government moved to de-politicise the post in 2007, not before time… It pains me as a nationalist to state this but our often revered independent legal system, or certainly the prosecution element of it, grossly failed when it delivered this gross miscarriage of justice. This issue and the outstanding flaws in this case, notably the million dollar payments made to key prosecution witnesses in return for their “evidence”, the failure to secure key material evidence and the contradictory evidence given by both Scottish and US police investigators means this issue is not going to move on anytime soon.

[Jo]

Also Joan, I cannot believe you uttered those words, "Let's move on." in relation to an incident where there is serious doubt about the guilt of a person who was convicted of a crime which cost almost 300 lives.

Megrahi did drop his appeal yes, more than TWO years AFTER it was granted leave to proceed. During that time the SNP government did nothing to ensure that such an important appeal was indeed heard: important not just to the convicted man but to Scotland. And we still don't know why, or under what pressures, Megrahi finally dropped it. By then he was a very sick man and he had seen the Scottish establishment delay his appeal again and again.

So I will not "move on" Joan, I will never "move on" because I went looking for the truth about this and was horrified starting with the trial transcripts.

And it seems to me the other body who could have taken this case up and won it, in the true "interests of Scots justice" was the Scottish media. Sadly too many in there are happy to do politics with the issue too. How happy were many in the media to write heart-wrenching pieces about the 20th anniversary of Lockerbie knowing that there was an appeal lying around with SIX grounds highlighting the possibility that the man convicted was not guilty? How much pressure did they bring to bear? Little or nothing.

[Jo]

Joan, they did not do the right thing. READ the trial transcripts. Read up on that SCCRC report and don't present your opinion as fact please, that is grossly unfair of you.

And please think about what you are saying about anyone, not just Megrahi, who has an on-going appeal which the political and judicial establishments can delay and eventually get rid of because they don't want the truth to come out. Those were the motives of the Unionist Parties all this time and to see the SNP assisting has shocked me to the core. There was no need for it. The appeal should have been heard.

They got it wrong on so many counts on this one that I have given up counting. THAT appeal was current. You know that phrase they kick around when it suits, sub judice? Well it applied here. It applied to Megrahi. NO talks should have been entered into re Megrahi until that appeal was heard, not just for Megrahi, but for Scotland. The SNP had two years to do it and an independent report from the SCCRC to support putting the judiciary under pressure to get that appeal heard. They could have brought all of the Parliament behind them and the Scottish people.

I want the truth about Lockerbie Joan, please tell me you do as well? Or are you saying that Scotland didn't have the right to know whether he was guilty or not of this tragedy over Scottish skies.

Are you saying it doesn't matter that Gauci, a main witness and his brother, were paid $3 million dollars for their testimony? Since when has that been allowed in a Scottish Court?

The previous comment makes a valid point that the SNP behaviour over this most serious of matters is now putting guaranteed SNP votes under pressure. That is absolutely true. And it is up to those who support that Party to pile the pressure on them because there is still time to undo the damage.

And finally to say the judiciary is independent of the political establishment is misguided and naive. It was a political decision to withhold from the original trial information about the break in at Heathrow on the morning PAN AM 103 was downed.

[joanmcalpine]

Let's not get carried away here. Our prosecution service is independent of government, thank goodness. The SNP did the right thing - unlike the others. Nobody forced Mr Megrahi to drop his appeal. He didn't die in a Scottish prison. Let's now move on.

[David McEwan Hill]

I agree with Jo.
The continued insistence by the SNP Government that they have no reason to doubt the verdict on Al Megrahi when virtually all intelligent and informed people have decided he is innocent is deeply damaging.
Having lost the support of those who were persuaded that he shouldn't have been released we are now loosing support of many who believe he is innocent. My 50 years plus membership of the SNP is being put under pressure by this.

[Jo]

The SNP most certainly are NOT exhonerated. The SCCRC findings were published just as they took office in 2007. And they should, along with the entire Parliament, not have been prepared to allow the Scottish judiciary to delay the hearing of an appeal into the conviction of a man said to be involved in the worst atrocity we have seen in the UK since WW2. That is a fact. Exactly why the SNP, and the Scottish Parliament were happy to keep the truth buried is a question only they can answer. But one thing is certain: their hands are now as contaminated as previous Labour and Tory UK governments are over Lockerbie.

There should have been no need for release on compassionate grounds, still guilty, when the man could have been released, truly free and acquitted of all charges.

As I said in the earlier post, READ the trial transcripts.

[Peter Thomson]

Today the Independent is running a story saying Megrahi only has days to live .... so it seems the medical specialists so denigrated by the US Senators were right in their prognosis, the Scottish Prison Service was correct in approving the application for early release on compassionate grounds and MacAskill was right to approve it.

This leaves the Unionist parties just where with their 'faux anger' given that other Wikileaks show that Blair had done the deal over Megrahi to help BP and then was baulked by Salmond and MacAskill pointing the England and Wales Prisoner Transfer Bill was not sovereign law in Scotland.

Will any journalist in the MSM in Scotland have the guts to attack Labour over their mendaciousness over this issue or will they simply carry on with Union goooood, SNP baaaad pap they feed us at present.

The sum of the Wikileaks on this clearly exhonorate the SNP and leave Labour and Westminster looking very,very shifty.

[Donnie MacNeill]

As always, a wounded animal lashes out blindly in all directions. The UK state has been wounded by these revelaations which, incidentally, most of us interested in the Lockerbie case had guessed some time ago.
Very early on in the case, I became convinced that Al Megrahi (and Fhima) had been provided as a willing scapegoat by Ghadaffi in order to bring Libya 'back into the international fold'. He was convicted on circumstncial evidence so flimsy and serendipidous, that any jury (save an American one) would have flung the case out of court before it even got under way.
All this manufactured 'shock and horror' is just window dressing, in order not to incur the wrath of the still grieving victims of Pan Am 103.

[Jo]

Not sure an apology is due. The right course for Salmond and MacAskill to go was to say, "Sorry, this particular prisoner has an existing appeal still to be heard. The appeal is supported by the Scottish Criminal Case Review Commission on six separate grounds which, the Commission believes suggest a miscarriage of justice could have occurred at the original trial."

Anyone who takes the time to read the trial transcripts cannot fail to see how extraordinary conclusions were reached by judges which utterly contradicted the evidence set before them. Those same judges, had a jury sat, would have been obliged to remind a jury that they could not convict unless the evidence supported the conviction. That these judges ignored this excellent advice themselves is quite astonishing.

[Colin]

I think demanding an apology would look a bit self-righteous. Plus, Labour haven't actually (explicitly) accused the Scottish government of freeing Megrahi as part of a dodgy quid pro quo - their main line of attack is merely that MacAskill is a wimp who likes criminals.

[Jason Stone]

Crikey. Just watching the BBC Scotland's coverage of this story and it's a shocker.

They're trying to suggest that Kenny Macaskill's claim that he alone made the decision is undermined by a leak which reveals that Alex Salmond had said that it was his decision rather than that of the UK government.

But surely that only backs the consistently made claim by the Scottish government that this was a Scottish decision rather than a UK decision.

The BBC has constructed an entire story out of the fact that Salmond is reported to have said 'my' rather than 'our'.

[Alastair]

These leaks must be deeply embarrassing for the likes of Murphy, Gray, and their neddish cohorts. If Labour were still in power in Westminster, I would say that a number of resignations would have to be tendered, including those of G. Brown and J. Straw. What a bunch of liars the Labour Party consist of.

No wonder BBC Scotland are trying to ignore the Wikileaks revelations in favour of a ludicrously aggressive ongoing attempt to embarrass the Transport Minister and blame him for not controlling the weather.

[Jason Stone]

I continue to believe that the Scottish government acted in good faith and the opprobrium cast their direction was extremely unwarranted.

The UK government appeared to recognise that the Scottish decision enabled them to have their cake and eat it and they have scoffed it with distasteful relish... and the rising clamour promoted by al-Megrahi's continuing survival redefines the boundary of bad taste.

Incidentally, Alex Salmond denied on the Today programme that he'd ever said that Scotland were offered 'treats' by the Libyans... he rather wryly observed that this was not his vernacular.

Joan, your acknowledgment that you were 'uncomfortable' with the decision at the time implies that you've changed your view since. Would you describe yourself as comfortable with the decision now?