Alex Massie Alex Massie

Peter Mandelson and the Lockerbie Bomber

No, there’s no connection. Liberal Vision’s Angela Harbutt has some fun suggesting that the Prince of Darkness has been on manoeuvres again, this time plotting to spring the Lockerbie bomber from his cell in Greenock prison. It runs like this: Peter Mandelson was on Corfu again this summer and there he met Colonel Gaddafi’s son. Just days later reports surfaced that Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi might be released. Coincidence? Surely not! Indeed, certainly not!

Now Miss Harbutt is, I assume, not being entirely serious. And nor, I trust, is Tory Bear when he leaps aboard this bandwagon. But doubtless this is the sort of thing that plenty of people are quite happy, even keen, to believe.

So it’s worth pointing out that it’s nonsense. Just to be on the safe side, you understand. Nonsense, because Mandelson has no power to determine whether Megrahi is released or not. Nor does any politician at Westminster. Equally, the idea that the Lockerbie bomber could be released on compassionate grounds has been around for some time now. Ever since it was determined tht his prostate cancer is terminal, in fact. So Mandelson’s discussions on Corfu are entirely irrelevant.

But Megrahi could not be released, even on compassionate grounds, while he was appealling his conviction. He’s subsequently dropped that appeal, clearing the way for him to be released on account of his cancer. If you want to find  conspiracy theory in any of this then here it is: the Scottish political and legal authorities are happy to release Megrahi on account of his cancer because they feared what might happen if his appeal went ahead and was upheld.

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