BRITISH PRIME Minister Gordon Brown has insisted the British Government did not make a private deal with Libya to ensure the release of the man convicted of the 1988 Lockerbie bomber, which killed 270 people.
Meanwhile, the minority Scottish government lost a vote in Edinburgh when opposition parties combined to condemn last month’s decision to let Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, who is suffering terminal cancer, return to Tripoli.
The controversy has damaged London’s relationship with Washington and caused difficulties within Mr Brown’s Labour Party, with leading Scottish party representatives critical of the release.
Speaking in Birmingham yesterday, the prime minister failed to deal directly with a key element of the saga: that one of his ministers told the Libyans Mr Brown did not want the Libyan intelligence agent to die in a Scottish jail.However, he did say: “There was no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double dealing, no deal on oil, no attempt to instruct Scottish ministers, no private assurances by me to Colonel Gadafy.”
He continued: “Our interest throughout has been to strengthen the coalition against international terrorism. I made it clear that for us there was never a linkage between any other issue and the Scottish government’s own decision about Megrahi’s future.
“Did we as a Government say we would try to stop the Scottish Executive and force Megrahi to die in prison? No, we did not do so, and did not have the power to do so – and that was the right thing to do,” he said.
Former British home secretary Jacqui Smith, who quit the British cabinet in June days before she was expected to be sacked, said Megrahi’s release did not “feel right” and she was “not sure” that she would have made it.
However, Ms Smith defended Mr Brown’s explanation of events, saying it was very clear from the files released by London and Edinburgh on Tuesday that the decision was one for the devolved Scottish administration alone.
Defending Scottish justice secretary Kenny MacAskill’s decision to release the bomber, Scottish first minister Alex Salmond said he was happy to have the support of leading Scottish church leaders and Nelson Mandela.
The three-hour debate began with a defence by Mr MacAskill of his decision to release the Libyan on compassionate grounds. He rejected charges that he should have allowed Megrahi to spend his final weeks or months in a private house, or hospital – saying it would require 48 armed police officers on permanent duty.
“The idea of an armed camp, or an international media circus in a residential area in Scotland – or even worse in a hospital setting – I found grotesque,” Mr MacAskill told the Edinburgh parliament.
However, former Labour first minister Jack McConnell said the Scottish justice secretary’s decision has breached promises given when Megrahi was first convicted and “tarnished for years to come” Scotland’s reputation.
Labour’s Scottish justice spokesman, Richard Baker, said the release had “been chaotic, badly mishandled and reflected badly” on Scotland, though he was jeered by Scottish Nationalists SMPs when he called Mr Brown’s views on the matter “irrelevant”.
A motion put down by the minority Scottish Nationalist administration, which said the release decision had followed judicial rules, was amended by Labour, Conservative and the Liberal Democrats. MSPs then voted by 73 to 50 with one abstention to pass a motion to state that the Edinburgh parliament “does not agree with [Mr MacAskill’s] decision to return Megrahi to Libya on compassionate release”.
The motion falls far short of a no-confidence vote in Mr Salmond’s administration, and Scottish Labour has little incentive to keep the controversy going given the difficulties it is causing for Mr Brown.
