Oh Christ, Bloody Lockerbie Again

Whaddyaknow, Wikileaks have some Lockerbie-related cables? Unfortunately they’re only about the release of Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi and so less interesting – or perhaps simply less illuminating – than Lockerbie-related cables from the investigation and trial years might be.

The Guardian’s headline is typically tendentious: Lockerbie bomber freed after Gaddafi’s ‘thuggish’ threats. This is true in as much as Gaddafi threatened to cut-off British business interests in Libya and then Megrahi was released. It is not true however that, as the headline implies, Megrahi was freed because of those threats. Nor, despite everything, is there any evidence in these cables that Gaddafi’s threats  – made to a body that was not responsible for the decision – had any impact upon Kenny MacAskill’s decision. (Maybe they did: there’s no evidence in these documents that this was so, however.)

Again (this blog’s Lockerbie archive can be found here) one may say that Megrahi’s cancer was useful for all concerned.