The government’s handling of the al-Megrahi affair has been colossally incompetent

David Boothroyd

The fact is that the UK Government had no role in the release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi - a fact which it has always made clear, which has not been contradicted, and which has been confirmed by its political opponents in the Scottish Executive.

If any statement was given by the UK government to the Libyans about Megrahi, it was entirely irrelevant to the decision about whether he would be freed because the UK government had no legal standing. Something to be borne in mind when one listens to David Cameron claim he would have stopped Megrahi being freed - he would not have had the power to do so either.

Chris lancashire

I agree with your views on the government's incompetence (although this stretches far beyond the Libyan issue) and I believe that Megrahi should not have been released.

All that aside, what exactly are the benefits of the "special relationship" with the USA? We have been used to buttress Washington's brainless foreign policy; Blair was Bush's bag carrier; we have a one way extradition treaty; no particular trade or economic benefits (i.e. the same as any other EU country other than a few crumbs from the Iraqui table).

All in all, yes I am in favour of a "Love Actually" moment with Obama as I cannot see what benefits the UK gets in return for being treated dismissively by an overmighty USA.

paracelsus

And the hole keeps getting deeper and deeper. Here's hoping this will finally bring down this shambolic excuse for a government. Wishful thinking, but who knows how this may finally play out.

General election please!

David Lindsay

Some old Reagan and Bush the Elder hand was on The World At One, decrying Britain's action over Lockerbie as, from America's point of view, "the most duplicitous in the post-War period", and the sort of thing that Americans would expect "from France and some other people in Europe".

Well, I still do not defend the decision over Lockerbie. But sheer bloody-mindedness has won the French at least as much American military assistance and support, and incomparably greater independence, than our very different attitude has ever won us. France, you see, is a self-respecting country. She was also our real ally during the Falklands War.

And the other Europeans? Germany, at least, has always been America's real ally of choice, even during the War. As soon as that was out of the way, first West Germany and then Germany attained exactly the prime position that one would expect, considering that Germans are America's largest ethnic group and that the House of Representatives once came within one vote of making German America's only official language. German recognition of the UDIs of two old Hapsburg provinces received immediate and unlimited American backing, resulting in the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s.

Nicholas

David Boothroyd - and that is entirely a ridiculous position which has been constructed by your beloved New Labour's ill-thought through and reckless imposition of "devolution".

Do you realise just how ridiculous you sound referring to the "UK" government and in the same sentence its lack of jurisdiction over Scotland? If the "UK" government has no jurisdiction of the other component parts of the "UK' then how in hell can it expect to maintain jurisdiction over England alone? Or maybe you think it appropriate that England has a Scot dominated New Labour government unwelcome in Scotland but happy to rule (and run roughshod over) England, all the while referring to itself, ridiculously and pompously, as the "UK" government?

Your New Labour house of cards. Idiots, idiots, idiots. Boy, is there ever a reckoning due to you people. Don't peddle your New Labour apologist propaganda here - we've had enough of it and you and your rotten lot are on borrowed time.

cuffleyburgers

Chris Lancs. - The term special relationship really refers I think to pooling of intelligence and a general feeling that we worked better with the americans than say the french, and to that extent it probably remains true.

The whole thing has been strained by over use of the term, and by misuse of the concept especially by (who else?) Blair who used it as a tool to enable him to strut on a bigger (and of course ultimately more lucrative) stage.

I think we would be very well advised to consider our strategic relations with the USA before those with Europe. Certainly our foreign policy and defence should be atlanticist. If nothing else our attempts to buy euro-kit have been expensive failures, even more so than our embarrassing attempts to buy US kit.

There is a very good op. ed. in the Indie today by Geoffrey Robertson QC with a link from Martin Bright which is both well informed and clearly thought out.

It beggars belief that the govt couldn't obtain this quality of advice before committing themselves.

But then this government's incompetence has been beggaring belief for years now.

Richard

Mr Milliband's monstering by Evan Davis on the Today programme was bitterly enjoyable.

He was pathetically bad - even at the political interview tradecraft. Waffling, loosing the logical thread, utterly unable to see what a fool he was making of himself and absolutely 1000' out of his depth. It is terrifying that this man, who makes George Brown look like Palmerston, is Foreign Secretary.

If only it was another issue with a Scottish dimension in the mode of March 1979...no chance.

Carly

Agree with you James. I must also say Bill Rammell looked absolutely dreadful on TV yesterday. Very shifty indeed. Looked like he'd undergone some enhanced interrogation techniques, ha ha!

Laura

This Government are incompetent at everything, that's why this country is in the state it's in.

JohnOfEnfield

In my opinion: -

1. There were NO grounds for compassion. MacAskill never gave any - other than that the prisoner is dying. In a case a grave as this with such a small proportion of the sentence served - this was insufficient grounds for clemency. Even a jumped up Scottish solicitor should be able to understand this.
2. This matter fell completely within the UK government's competence (I use the word very loosely) as it has a fundamental impact on our foreign relations.
3. The prisoner has never shown any remorse. In spite of one trial and an appeal
4. No consideration was given to the completely predictable reaction by his sponsors (Libya).
5. Why were relations with Libya set above those with our closest ally (the US)?

Gordon Brown and one of the Miliband's (the one with a banana) should resign forthwith.

winston smith

Megrahi is an innocent patsy. That is obvious to anyone who has bothered to read the evidence from his trial. All this 'outrage' about his release should be outrage at his wrongful conviction.

http://winstonsmithwillwin.blogspot.com/

oldtimer

Brown`s and his government`s attempts to distance themselves from the decision have failed. It is now clear that they have been trying (over the past few years) to devise a legal maze through which al-Megrahi could return to Libya. The problem for them is that the defence of plausible deniability (ie it was all down to the Scottish Justice Minister) does not stand the test of public scrutiny.

I now recall that, a few days before the decision to release him, we were being bombarded through the media with the idea that al-Megrahi was not guilty at all, that it was a miscarriage of justice, and that the perpetrators really came from/were funded by Syria and/or Iran. Obviously it was all part of the plan to soften us up before the release. It did not persuade me.

Bickers

David Boothroyd

You must be a NuLabour supporter to believe the drivel you've just spouted. NuLabour's westminster prints are all over the crime scene - if you'd just care to look

rmh

Ah come on, we all know he didn't do it, this is a light wind compared to the hurricane once he was freed on appeal.

RobertD

David Boothroyd.

Devolution retain full powers over foreign affairs to the UK government including any matter that impinges on the UK's relationship with any other country including Libya and the USA. Under Scottish law the Scottish Justice Minister has a discretionary power. I believe it would have been lawful for a UK Foreign or Prime Minister to "instruct" a Scottish Justice Minister not to exercise this discretion to remain in compliance with the UK's international obligations and its international policy interests in the same way as it would have "instructed" the UK Justice Minister in similar circumstances.

However it is a hypotheical point because the UK government clearly considered its obligations on combatting terrorism and our long term strategic relationship with the US as worth less than a vague promise of a few barrels of oil and the opportunity for British companies to do work for Libya that the Libyans had no capacity to do for themselves.

Simples Stupids

Swiss Bob

You can see Brown's statement here on YouTube:

/www.the-daily-politics.com/2009/09/brown-on-release-of-megrahi.html">Brown on Sky News finally speaks the release of Megrahi.

Percy

You've got to hand it to Brown, it really is incredible that people in this country are now more inclined to believe the Libyan government than their own.

General Zod

Milliband was hilariously bad on Today. "We were not actively seeking his death in prison." So you weren't planning to murder him. That does not answer the question as to what Gordon actually thinks of the release.

drakes drum

The man of courage gave his announcement in a situation where he could not be questioned!

A carefully prepared script.

I do not like Cameron. I think he will be as poor a PM as Brown, but that said, he is right to call for an enquiry into this rotten affair.

On oath so that Mandleson, Brown and Blair + the boss of BP cannot lie themselves out of this one.

Verity

Without prejudice, it's worth mentioning that the "special relationship" will be basically inactive while Obama's president. He's got a Kenyan background and he went over to Kenya to support some half-brother or other to run for office on a shariah, largely anti-British, platform years before he got famous.

I would not count on Obama for anything.

Swiss Bob

Sorry about the previous illiterate post.

This is the link to the video, please feel free to embed it:

Brown on Megrahi’s release

Chris lancashire

drakes drum - Come on, I'm prepared for Cameron to be a disappointment but nobody, absolutely nobody, can approach the pure, distilled, incompetence of Brown.

wonderfulforhisage

I saw a comment on another blog, can't remember which one, that rather cynically posited the following. Say you were a very strong europhile and felt that the UK was leaning too much towards the USA what better way to push us towards Europe than to do damage to the 'special relationship'. The chap positing this went on to suggest that one of Her Majesty's ministers who is a very keen europhile might have orchestrated the rift between us and the USA. He named a name but his case fell apart as the person he named was not only a Minister of the Crown but also a member of the House of Lords.

True Belle

Is Milliband in line to be the fall guy - Pay back time?

Procrustes

A few observations:

This deal is about gas not oil.

There is no guarantee we will see any of it. Libya has form for nationalising its oil and gas industry -it could happen again.

BP's exploration work could lead to gas for us but not before 2018.

The above suggests we have negotiated a deal which:

Gives Libya a win
Might give us a win in 9 years
Has annoyed the US

Stephen Rothbart

From the multitude of anti-US sentiment appearing in the commentary pages of this and other articles in other publications, the gross mishandling and duplicity of Brown's government might actually come back to help him.

The constant referral to the 'Love Actually' moment shows that we Brits have a deep felt loathing of the USA, and if we can find a way to snub her, then we will.

Hugh Grant will no doubt be recruited to play Brown in the next 'Majesty' film about the Queen.

For my part, I just appreciate that the US decided to support democracy against Nazi Germany and later sent its young men and women to live in military bases all across Europe without interfering in the host countries' politcs in order to stop Stalin's troops moving all the way to the Atlantic coast,and this was something they continued to do for the next 60 years.

The whingers and whiners about America would do well to remember that their ability to have a point of view on anything political is owed to that decision and the American military that finally brought Soviet domination of Europe to its knees, and opened up the whole of Europe to a form of freedom not enjoyed by most of the world's populations.

For Brown's gang and the SNP's to have abused this in such an underhand way is neither heroic nor is it compassion.

Americans were the main victims of this crime, and they have a right to be heard.

Their support for the IRA does not make two wrongs into a right either.

PauL

I understand that this is doing wonders for McTurds public profile in the States. Apperently, a lot of people are finding out that his name isn't Norman Brown after all.

Nicholas

Stephen Rothbart your post has considerable merit but I think you over plead the US case. Their post-war activities were not without a considerable dollop of self-interest and necessitated in part by their deliberate bankrupting of Britain as a major world power. I suggest you read Peter Clarke's "The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire" for a slightly different perspective on the Special Relationship and who owed what to whom.

Also I think your reading of the end of the Cold War is somewhat starry eyed. America did not stand alone.

Stephen Rothbart

Nicholas, did Britain create an Empire without a 'dollop' of self-interest? Every country looks out for its own. Removing the power of the British Empire so that American business could replace it was just a replay of successive British governments since Elizabeth I's reign doing the same thing to Spain, Holland, France and, yes the USA's interests in the Carribbean. That is what nation states do.

The British Empire might have been good for some of the people of Britain and their puppet goverments abroad, but it did not always benefit those that lived within it, as demonstrated by the Indians and Africans that so badly wanted out. Remember the Boer war anyone?

The cold war was indeed won by the Americans because they provided most of the armaments for the NATO or SHAFE members, beat Russia and Germany to harnass nuclear weapons to create dominance and a nuclear stalemate.

Put it another way, take American military influence away from NATO, and do you really believe the puny armies of postwar Britain and France (who else had one?) could withstand the Russian might with nuclear arms?

Nicholas

" . . . did Britain create an Empire without a 'dollop' of self-interest?"

Of course not. But Britain did not mask its imperial ambitions whilst pretending to represent itself as the pinnacle of democracy and freedom. What of Hawaii? Would Britain's Empire have been less prone to criticism by our "allies" if we had cunningly made the overseas territories "counties" of England?

"The British Empire might have been good for some of the people of Britain and their puppet goverments abroad, but it did not always benefit those that lived within it, as demonstrated by the Indians and Africans that so badly wanted out."

Tired, tired and tainted with a left wing perspective, revealed by your use of the word "puppet". A close examination of the realities of Empire, whilst not rose-tinted, shows just how far this left wing assessment, rooted in much myth and propaganda, has prevailed to make us ashamed of our Imperial past. There was much good in it too and I venture much of the world would today be better governed and less dangerous if Pax Brittanica had prevailed. If you think our Empire was bad you should read more about the French, Dutch and Spanish, and, yes, the Americans in the Phillipines. However I realise it is difficult to obtain a more rounded perspective in a country where socialism has dominated education and impregnated a self-loathing of our own history. I don't expect to change entrenched minds but I do wish to articulate a dissenting viewpoint.

Anyway, the point I was making was not so much a defence of Empire as the extent to which America connived and intrigued to deprive Britain of it.

And one of the very reasons Britain's postwar armies were so puny was because America imposed a greater burden of debt on Britain than was imposed in reparations on the Axis powers. A shameful act of betrayal of the country which had ensured by its stand the ultimate liberation of Western Europe from the Nazis. And part of the construct of the Cold War, apart from Churchill's naivety and trust in dealings with them, was the American cosying and conniving with Stalin at the end of the war. Of Britain's wartime allies only Canada emerges with honour. The rest basically shafted us.

carlung

I heard Dr John Swire on the BBC say that after his years of research he is convinced that Al Megrahi is innocent

Stephen Rothbart

Nicholas, we seem to be alone conducting a debate here, perhaps one of us will soon be blocked!

You could not be more wrong about my political leanings. I am a right of centre, Zionist, GOP supporting Englishman, who lives in the Czech Republic, which you may recall was so badly betrayed by our so called Empire to Hitler. This arguably was the defining moment that eventually led to the War starting in the first place.

In fact Britain's post war army was puny because it had been puny before the pre-war period. Peace-mongers of the same ilk that released almegrahi from jail in the hope that appeasing homicidal dictators like Gaddafi and Hitler would reap dividends was the cause of this disgraceful state of affairs.

As for Britain not pretending to be a beacon of democracy, no, we proclaimed ourselves to be beacons of Christian learning and good governance. I am not sure we lived up to our PR.

Either way, it does not matter. Obviously you clearly think that the USA is bad for the world, and happily, no one in the US government is going to stop you having that opinion.

Had Hitler or Stalin prevailed, well, you could still have said the USA was bad, but you would not have been able to hold similar views on their leadership.

For the record of what my readings have led me to understand, Churchill was not naive about Stalin at all, and tried hard to persuade the US Government to continue fighting against Stalin once Hitler was defeated.

However, neither the British Government, nor the US leaders were prepared to push their war-weary soldiers into another war with a country they had just recently been allies with.

The Cold war started then, but it was a war of espionage, political manoeuvering and manipulation, while both the US and her allies in Europe tried to rebuild their shattered econmies so that Stalin's communism could not take root.

I too am proud of the way Canada behaved, but so did India, and I am sure the Aussies will be suprised to be excluded from your warm praise considering the numbers of their troops that died in the cause.

Perhaps by 'shafting' us, you were referring to our regular pastings by them in cricket?

Nicholas

"I too am proud of the way Canada behaved, but so did India, and I am sure the Aussies will be suprised to be excluded from your warm praise considering the numbers of their troops that died in the cause."

I humbly stand corrected about your personal political leanings but was characterising your perspective re Empire (and as being typical to the modern British) rather than you personally.

I'm not sure I would go so far as to state the USA was "bad" for the World. I think there are many more and worse bogeymen. But I do think our received wisdom about their unstinting (it was not) support during the war (and more pertinently immediately afterwards) is rose-tinted and hardly reciprocated. In that I think it is important to distinguish between the military and the political. The two tend to become conflated whereby any criticism of the USA is perceived as being disrespectful to the efforts and sacrifices of their troops. That was and is not my intention. Also the American tendency to be chauvinistic about their war history probably influences my feelings towards them. It is probably more accurate to say I think Britain ultimately had a raw deal from them and paid, literally and in many ways, for every iota of their support. I think the USA could and should have shown more magnanimity, generosity, warmth and appreciation to the British during 1945 and afterwards, not least in recognition of their unique role in making the ultimate defeat of Hitler possible. We were not alone in being betrayed. The USA did the same thing to Chiang Kai Shek's Republic of China, to South Vietnam and also Cambodia .

I take the point about my freedom to hold such views but I still maintain that is more thanks to the stand of the British in 1940 than the entry of the USA to the war in 1942. Btw I held warm and untroubled feelings towards the USA until recent years but reading about the history in more depth, particularly relating to the Far East, has changed that.

Yes, I agree about India but unfortunately excluded them as an "ally" per se considering them to be in a different category to the Dominions - perhaps an arbritary and unfair criterion.

I would certainly not wish to diminish Australia's military contribution to the overall war effort but in her political dealings with the mother country she was not particularly supportive or friendly. Again I make the distinction between her political and military endeavours.

I'm not sure I share your view about Churchill's attitude towards Stalin and Russia. Clarke is very good on that aspect and worth a read.

No, the shafting was political but aided and abetted by forces within Britain acting in concert with the Comintern. The post war history of Britain is one of incremental and bloodless socialist-communist revolution to a degree that it is now difficult if not impossible to cut through socialist myth to get at the truth. It is ironic that this accelerated with the final demise of the USSR at the end of the Cold War. In many ways I feel our prospects might now be better if we had been subsumed by the Soviets in 1945 and had had the opportunity to exorcise our own demons reflecting the images of Honicker and Cousesceau instead of giving them to rule over us.

W R Stevenson

Looks like that Megrahi guy is going to snuff it real soon. I really do not care all that much about a storm in a teacup. Why the lack of any sense of proportion in his issue?

Why should we not secure our sources of oil and gas? If the US could supply us with oil and gas we could tell Magaffi to shove it. Until that time it will be business as usual.