Merged [Ed] Convicted Lockerbie bomber released

Donal said:
Edited by Darat: 
Removal of part of a post moved to AAH.


So issuing one statement is "scweams and scweams" (must be more of that Oxford English). And wanting to see a sentence handed down by a court legally carried out is blood lust.
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I recommend the Just William stories to you.

The Scottish system allows for something called 'compassion'. What has happened to Megrahi is the sentence being legally carried out under Scottish law. Continually howling about keeping a dying man in prison when the law allows otherwise is indeed akin to blood lust and demonstrates once again how rabid the US right actually is and how they do not share our values.

There seems to be an old testament new testament divide on this issue between the USA and the UK with most US families and their government apparently calling for an old testament style vengeful retribution while the UK families seem to hold more to a new testament stance - forgiveness, compassion, truthfulness.

The vengeful nature of the statements from the USA are especially hypocritical given the recent official torture policy and the still open Guantanamo Bay. The USA ignored the imprecations of the world about its official torture programme which was illegal. Now we are ignoring a country that flouted human rights when it wishes.

Perhaps the USA could bring their own lawbreakers (such as Cheney et al) before a court to be tried for their offences before trying to stop other law abiding countries following their own laws?
 
Cainkane1 said:
What blood lust? All she suggested was that you keep a terrorist in prison. She didn't say burn him at the stake.
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Scotland is carrying out the sentence as per its own laws. That is not good enough for the US government and many of the US relatives. They have demanded that Scotland act in the interests of the US - not in the interests of the Scottish people. Demanding that Scotland not show compassion to an fatally ill man is blood lust.

The USA government is not getting what it wants - tough. Sort out your own criminals and start acting lawfully before you try and order other countries about. You could start with your torturers, who are still wandering around the USA free and unfettered.
 
Policenaut said:
This compassion rule seems ill conceived. I think your system already shows more than enough compassion by not having a death penalty. Compassion to the prisoner and his family is also a slap in the face to the victims. I'm speaking generally here and not to this specific case because I don't know enough about it. But like I said last night Wolf was grilling your justice secretary. I haven't really seen him go after someone that hard before.
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Well of course Kenny was a sitting duck, because he couldn't say the obvious. Which was that the doubts over the conviction are so great that Megrahi had a good chance of being acquitted on appeal anyway, but he didn't have enough time left to see the appeal through. Kenny's a lawyer, he knows the score. He has to defend the verdict and he's not allowed even to imply that the conviction might be unsafe, no matter what he might think about it. Which of course gives a onesided view of the affair to those not already aware of the background.

I saw Kenny being grilled by Gordon Brewer and by Gavin Esler last night. He was obviously quite prepared to be toasted to the max about it. He was lucky he didn't get Paxmaned as well. Anyway, the entire SNP cabinet is used to that, because the UK media all hate the SNP's guts. Just another day at the office, really.

Rolfe.
 
Professor Yaffle said:
And it's not like they don't have something similar in the USA:

http://meetings.abanet.org/webuploa...atedresources/3582PolicyCJSstatement42307.doc
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Yes we have it. I've never heard of it being used on someone convicted of murdering 270 people though. I think there would have been riots if someone like Terry Nichols had terminal cancer and was released on 'compassionate' grounds. I don't know all the minute details about the Lockerbie case (it appears the whole truth is never to be known) so I won't speculate on whether he was actually guilty or innocent. All I know is that he was convicted of the crime and was subsequently released only because he was dying.
 
Nogbad said:
What oil deals? BP are a UK company not a Scottish company. If there was an economic element then that came from the Foreign Office and Westminster not Holyrood.
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Yes. The oil deal part was actually part of the Tony Blair 2007 deal to have Megrahi released as a prisoner transfer. Nothing to do with the SNP.

The bit that I think suggests SNP skulduggery is the bit where Kenny MacAskill seems to have pressurised Megrahi to drop his appeal before being granted compassionate leave.

Rolfe.
 
Alt+F4 said:
He's gone from calling her a bully to saying she's demanding blood lust. Hilliary must scare the heck out of him.
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Au contraire - It is possible to accurately describe someone's behaviour without being scared of them. I commend it to you.


As you know I am celebrating at her and the US government being run off, correctly, by the Scottish government, after representations from its citizens, including me.

Kenny for ever.
 
Yeah the SNP can take some pride in snubbing their noses at the relatives of the passengers in the US.
Salmond and co are class acts.
 
Rolfe said:
Well of course Kenny was a sitting duck, because he couldn't say the obvious. Which was that the doubts over the conviction are so great that Megrahi had a good chance of being acquitted on appeal anyway, but he didn't have enough time left to see the appeal through. Kenny's a lawyer, he knows the score. He has to defend the verdict and he's not allowed even to imply that the conviction might be unsafe, no matter what he might think about it. Which of course gives a onesided view of the affair to those not already aware of the background.

I saw Kenny being grilled by Gordon Brewer and by Gavin Esler last night. He was obviously quite prepared to be toasted to the max about it. He was lucky he didn't get Paxmaned as well. Anyway, the entire SNP cabinet is used to that, because the UK media all hate the SNP's guts. Just another day at the office, really.

Rolfe.
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Yes there was a fair to do about it over on the Guardian board with people saying that MacAskill's position is now untenable. I can't quite get my head around how they think Holyrood works, what MacAskill's job actually is, how it relates to the SG cabinet and how the SG relates to Westminister.

When taken to task about some of this one poster said "Oh well I don't know anything about Scottish politics".

Mental!
 
Alt+F4 said:
Absolutely. My issue is with some posters that think the UK is somehow morally superior when it comes to playing politics. You may call them crisps, we may call them potato chips, but we're really not different at all.
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Au contraire. This episode and the furore and systematic lies in the USA by the rabid right over the NHS demonstrate that the USA is very different for the UK in an increasing number of ways, including core values.
 
Plenty answers in the other thread on the subject though.

Rolfe said:
I watched the return quite carefully, and what I saw was someone who was allowed to mount the aircraft steps at Tripoli carrying on in a jubilant manner and punching the air, both before and after he actually greeted Megrahi. It turns out this person was Lamin Fhimah, Megrahi's friend, colleague and co-accused, who was acquitted of all charges relating to Lockerbie. [As an aside, logic really dictates that either both men were guilty or neither was. One of these verdicts has to be wrong. Why assume it can't be the Megrahi one?]

There were a fair number of other people on the tarmac, and I'd love to talk to one or two of them and ask why they were there. Many may simply have been Megrahi's family and friends - he apparently belongs to a very important tribe. But on the whole, I think GT was probably right.

Guybrush Threepwood said:
I imagine that most Libyans view him as a brave member of the Libyan security services who was wrongly convicted of a terrible crime in the country that bombed their capital for no clear reason, and without consequences in 1986. So why wouldn't they welcome him home?
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I really don't imagine that anyone there was cheering the man who blew up Pan Am Flight 103. They were cheering their compatriot who had been wrongly accused and unjustly convicted. And they were glad that the Scottish Government had done the right thing in view of his sad illness.
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Rolfe.
 
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Nogbad said:
Have you listed the Americans relatives?

Jim Swire and Rev Mosey who act as spokesmen for the UK relatives group spoke in favour of release but want an enquiry.
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Somehow I thought that might be the only names you came up with.
 
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