Most Americans were momentarily outraged a year ago when al-Megrahi, the bomber behind the Lockerbie killings, was released from prison with the ostensibly accurate news that he had but three months to live.
Prostate cancer, a notoriously slow-moving disease, was the culprit for the killer who blew up Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie in the south Scotland in 1988, killing 11 Scots on land, 243 passengers, and 16 crew members for a total of 270 dead. Abdebasit Ali al- Megrahi has now lived almost nine months beyond the prescribed three, and his doctor, Dr. Karol Sikora, told the Times of London, that the killer could live another ten or even twenty years.
Dr. Sikora quickly backtracked from his latest calculations, but that was only after it became known he was picked by Libyan officials who had not only paid him for his prognosis but also plied him with the three-months-before death requirement. The Scottish Minister of Justice said there was little his government could do in the face of such an imminent demise, and that he was all but required to let el-Megrahi fly away home.
Of course, a Scottish doctor might have a different diagnosis than one from Libya, particularly if that doctor is on the Libyan payroll. Dr. Sikora might also have had a different diagnosis than an American doctor, who might be inclined to let the Lockerbie killer rot in jail for several millennia.
As of this moment we know there's even more to the story: the small matter of BP's multi-billion dollar oil deal with Libya, announced shortly after el-Megrahi's release. BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward, no longer awash in the Gulf Oil spill, refused to return to the United States for a Senate hearing on the matter in the week just past, and Scottish and English officials both said they had no intention of flying across the pond to tell their story in front of an accusatory American firing squad.
Despite it all, we the people are soaked in assurances that Libya is both off the nuclear list and no longer a state sponsor of terrorism. Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi is allowed to ramble on at the United Nations and consider pitching a tent near The Ramble in Central Park.
We kid ourselves that justice has been done. But what would the families of the Lockerbie dead say about what happened? What could I say to my late high school classmate and teammate, C.T. Fisher, who died on that flight before he could watch his daughter grow up?
I would say this really sucks and I'm going to do something about it.
John Lamont, the Scottish Tory justice spokesman, said: "Alex Salmond must now prove publicly that Mr Megrahi is at death's door or he should not be released."
Robert Brown, for the Liberal Democrats, said the decision was "wrong in principle, wrong in practice and set the wrong precedent".
Those pushy US Senators that so offend Boboldsocks are calling for an investigation because the Scottish government will not come clean on the release of this convicted murderer of 270 persons. It was just revealed, after a YEAR, that none of the doctors cited as having provided medical advice on the prisoner's condition were actually consulted. It took a reporter to track them all down, since their names had been redacted "for medical privacy reasons" and they all said they had not been consulted on the release from prison. If the Scottish government will not investigate this, they cant very well complain when someone else is trying to find out the truth. The US victims families are not seeking vengeance, as some of the comments claim, but justice. The truth will come out. It usually does, and those who deny it should be shamed.
Your condescension aside, that proves what, exactly? Oh noes, opposition politicians criticise the government! That's never happened before.
"Those pushy US Senators that so offend Boboldsocks are calling for an investigation because the Scottish government will not come clean on the release of this convicted murderer of 270 persons."
I suggest you petition your senators to direct their questions to the US and UK governments, the Scottish government has released all of the documents it has concerning Megrahi's release apart from certain correspondence with the aforementioned which they have refused to allow published.
"If the Scottish government will not investigate this..."
It has been investigated and a handful of US senators who know nothing about the case or Scots law are hardly likely to throw any light on such complex proceedings in one or two afternoon sessions. That aside, Megrahi was not guilty of the crimes for which he was convicted simply because he did not receive a fair trial. Why? The UK and US governments withheld evidence of the supply of timers identical to the one used to blow up flight 103 from the defence, citing "national security" or "not in the public interest". The 2007 Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission report, from which all mention of the above document was blacked out, also cites new evidence that was not made available to the defence.
I'm amazed at the double standards here.....the Americans confuse justice with vengeance, and are prepared to drag professional doctors through the mud to justify their own perception of justice.
This article is wrong on all levels....biased, ill informed and hyprocritical.
"But what would the families of the Lockerbie dead say about what happened?"
At the time of the decision to release Megrahi the spokesman for the families of the Scots killed in the terrorist attack had this to say:
"Dr Jim Swire, the veteran Lockerbie campaigner who lost his daughter Flora, said he did not believe the Libyan was guilty, adding: "The sooner he is back home with his family the better. I think it would be inhumane and downright cruel to keep him in jail.""
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/scotland/6026062/Lockerbie-bombing-Victims-families-fury-at-Megrahis-release.html
Puts rather a different complexion on things, doesn't it? No clamour for bloodthirsty revenge here, thankfully.
It's time the senate committee, which has no remit and no jurisdiction, shut up. The decision was taken by the duly elected and constituted government of Scotland; it's none of their business why or how that decision was reached.
Is the writer also suggesting that a US doctor or a Scottish doctor would dignose an illness differently according to their thoughts on the patients supposed crimes?
And how about the families of the more than 100 people murdered when the U.S. military bombarded Libya, including a densely populated suburb in the capital?
At least the U.S. families got 10 million dollar per victim. Now, compare than with the few thousands dollar that the U.S. give as a compensation to the families of civilians it murders in Afghanistan. And that is in the best case, when the US military reports the crime, and take responsibility for it, which rarely happens. Note that the Wikileaks war logs show that hundreds of civilian killings by NATO go unreported.
I am sick of this hypocrisy and double standards.
"Dr. Sikora quickly backtracked from his latest calculations, but that was only after it became known he was picked by Libyan officials..."
Incorrect. It's been known since last year that Sikora was paid by the Libyans, a fact which isn't terribly important given that his diagnosis played no part whatsoever in the decision to release Megrahi. And, as it happens, he didn't actually backtrack on his comments about the possibility of Megrahi surviving ten years - he simply clarified them for the benefit of a media that seemed determined to misconstrue his meaning.
"a Scottish doctor might have a different diagnosis than one from Libya..."
Just as well, then, that the only diagnoses that were taken into account were from Scottish doctors.
"But what would the families of the Lockerbie dead say about what happened?"
Far starters, they would disagree sharply with each other. The majority of British families supported Megrahi's release on compassionate grounds, and many of them have severe doubts about Megrahi's guilt - understandable given the SCCRC report that referred Megrahi's case back to the Court of Appeal. That appeal would have started last autumn had it not been for Megrahi's illness, and might well have cleared him by now.