EDINBURGH, Scotland: Scottish officials said Saturday they were right to release a Libyan man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing because he was dying of cancer, even though he is still alive two years later.
Abdel Baset Al-Megrahi was convicted in 2001 of murdering 270 people, most of them American, by blowing up a Pan Am plane over the Scottish town of Lockerbie on Dec. 21, 1988.
He was freed on Aug. 20, 2009, after prison doctors said he had prostate cancer and estimated he had only three months to live. He is still alive, and last month he appeared at a televised rally in Tripoli alongside Muammar Qaddafi.
| Looked healthier than Daffy did, in fact, though he has to be wondering just how lucky he is to be out of a British prison and in the middle of a civil war -- and on the losing side... |
In a statement, a spokesman for Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond said the decision to release Al-Megrahi was made "on compassionate grounds and compassionate grounds alone" and was not influenced by economic, political or diplomatic factors.
"Whether people support or oppose the decision, it was made following the due pro-cess of Scots law, we stand by it, and Al-Megrahi is dying of terminal prostate cancer," he said.
| Thus doubling-down on stupid... |
A leading cancer specialist, however, said 59-year-old Al-Megrahi appeared to be receiving a cutting-edge hormone treatment and could live for several more years.
Prof. Roger Kirby, a consultant urologist at the Prostate Cancer Center in London, said, "He has long outlived the speculative three-month prognosis, and it appears he may continue to do so for a while yet."
Al-Megrahi, a former Libyan intelligence officer, is the only person convicted over the Lockerbie bombing, Britain's worst terrorist attack. |