The Megrahi debate:

justice done or

justice denied?

Brian Fitzpatrick

 

www.bobsmithart.com

Dr Richard Simpson (23 August) provides a welcome diagnosis of the continuing problems for Messrs Macaskill and Salmond on the early release of Al-Megrahi.
     Our justice minister presumably hoped the passage of time might remove the media spotlight, if not the troublesome former prisoner. Yet, as we hear the final tocsin sound for the Qaddafi regime and its adherents, including the once powerful al-Megrahi clan, that proves to be a vain hope.
     We should not,however, detain ourselves on a passing ministerial career – it seems certain that the US will ask the incoming Libyan government to make the senior apparatchiks of the regime and any remaining intelligence materials available both to the ICC and, perhaps, the US courts. But it was over our skies and on our soil that 270  innocents were murdered. Scotland should not be a bystander. If Scotland's justice system is to start rebuilding its reputation (a task one would think might recommend itself to ministers committed to securing this jurisdiction as a centre for international arbitration) might I suggest some further preparatory questions be addressed by the minister:
     (1) Will he publish the draft and final submissions made to him by justice department officials anent the release, particularly the medical evidence and, if not,why not?
     (2) Is it true that the prison GP provided a reprise on a report by Dr Karol Sikora, himself not a prostate cancer expert who has in any event disowned his findings? When we read that Dr Sikora 'assessed' al-Megrahi's prospects of survival, does that mean he did not, in fact, examine him?
     (3) Is it correct that doctors at the Beatson Oncology Centre were instructed not to comment on the published material re al-Megrahi's medical condition nor on the credentials of Dr Sikora to proffer an opinion on survival?
     (4) Is it correct, as Dr Simpson also suggests, that al-Megrahi discontinued treatment in order to worsen his prognosis?
     There is the prospect in the coming weeks that, far from this being an entrenched and mostly sterile debate on the merits of al-Megrahi's guilt and release, real light might be shed on these issues. At the very least, Scottish ministers owe the murdered and their survivors a measure of the justice due to them – until now deferred but, hopefully, not to be forever denied.

 

Brian Fitzpatrick is an advocate

 

David McEwan Hill

The furore manufactured again about Abdulbasset Ali Al-Megrahi is as shameful as it is predictable. And, I might add, about as politically honest as the farce at Camp Zeist which convicted him.
     It is a measure of the lack of abilities and lack of political judgement of those who seek to use his release against the Scottish Government that we are here again, with the same failed campaign with its steadily diminishing effect – if, in fact, it ever had any significant effect at all.
     In my judgement, it is now having the opposite effect to its intention with a fairly substantial section of the intelligent and informed Scottish electorate.
I get about a bit and I have met recently no person who is remotely exercised by the release of Al-Megrahi. Most responsible Scottish opinion has expressed support for the release but even those who were unsure do understand that it was done in full accord with proper procedure and in good faith and that there was no apparent political element to the decision.
      Consequently the feigned outrage by political enemies of the Scottish Government and the obedient press chorus which parrots it increasingly irritates and the re-entry to the fray of under-pressure and under-informed American senators seeking personal political benefit is offensive – none of which does any disservice to Alex Salmond's administration.
     What I find particularly distasteful, however, is the behaviour of the Labour Party in Scotland over this issue. The Labour Party I knew and remember with considerable respect would never have behaved in the crass and distasteful manner with which it has dealt with this issue. But then again the behaviour of some of the more vociferous of its present members would have been offered no comfort inside the Labour Party I used to know. Every time Labour aligns itself with right-wing and reactionary elements and disgraces itself on this and other issues more of Labour's intelligent and principled Scottish support walks away from it.
     Had Messrs Gray, Mundell and Rennie half a political wit between them they would have been ahead of Alex Salmond in expressing concern about Scotland being included in English riots. So determined are they to oppose anything the SNP government does that they appear to support the idea that English students should get free education they can't get in England paid for them in Scotland by Scotland. And according to them the release of Al Megrahi has embarrassed Scotland in front of America. Is this the America that routinely executes minors and the mentally subnormal, the America where you can buy a sub-machine gun in your neighbourhood store, the America that gave us Guantanamo Bay and Abu Gharaib?
      To the huge satisfaction of most Scots, America got the traditional double digit response the last time it tried it on with Alex Salmond’s government and I look forward to a repeat performance.

 

David McEwan Hill spent 15 years in West Africa on an educational aid programme where, among other things, he was principal of a woman teachers' college and an educational inspector. He is an elected member of the SNP's national council