The former South African president, Mr Nelson Mandela, has called for a new appeal in the case of the Lybian convicted of the Lockerbie bombing, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, and said his imprisonment in Scotland amounts to "psychological persecution."
Mr Mandela made the call following his visit with al-Megrahi, who was convicted of his part in the deaths of 270 people by smuggling a bomb aboard Pan Am Flight 103, which exploded over Lockerbie on December 21st 1988.
Speaking in Scotland today, Mr Mandela said the fact that Megrahi faced the prospect of serving such a long term alone amounted to "a second punishment".
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Mr Nelson Mandela
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When asked if he believed al-Megrahi was innocent, Mr Mandela said the Crown at the trial had argued al-Megrahi alone could never have committed the crime.
He compared al-Megrahi's ordeal with his own term of 27 years in jail, mostly spent at Robbin Island, near Cape Town. He said: "the difference was that I was with other prisoners, I was not alone."
Mr Mandela said the fact that al-Megrahi was being held on his own was not a deliberate act on the part of the authorities, but to change his conditions required the intervention of British Prime Minsiter Mr Tony Blair, who up to now had been "very supportive" of things put to him. He also called for his transfer to a jail in a Muslim country.
Mr Mandela said he had hoped to meet relatives of Lockerbie victims when he returns to Scotland in July.
In a wider appeal for penal reform, Mr Mandela called for a more progressive attitude to punishment in developed countries.
AP