Gordon Brown didn't want the Lockerbie bomber to die in jail, but why is he so reluctant to admit it?
By Matthew Champion.
First Brown remained stoically silent on the release on compassionate grounds of Abdelbaset Ali Al Megrahi.
Everyone wanted to know what the prime minister thought about the decision, which, as we all know - since it has been drummed into our ears until they bleed - was made solely by the Scottish executive and more specifically its justice secretary Kenny MacAskill.
In No 10 this was thought sufficient a reason for Brown to avoid commenting on the issue, but Conservative complaints that the prime minister had been quicker to wax lyrical about Jade Goody, Susan Boyle and England's Ashes victory were, for once, justified.
Did Gordon Brown kill Jade Goody? Did he subject Susan Boyle to the scrutiny of a global TV audience despite her fragile mental state? Did he take the crucial wickets that saw Australia defeated in the final Ashes Test?
He didn't decide any of these events but he told people what he thought about them, so why couldn't the PM do the same when Megrahi was released eight years into a life sentence for the murder of 270 people on board Pan Am flight 103 in 1988?
It's not as if he didn't have an opinion, a chain of events started with the publication of letters on the website of the Scottish executive, as well as the Ministry of Justice and Foreign and Commonwealth Office, last night proved that.
Minutes of a meeting between Scottish and Libyan officials earlier this year showed that the Libyan delegation claimed to have been told by Foreign Office minister Bill Rammell that 'neither the prime minister nor the foreign secretary would want Mr Megrahi to pass away in prison'.
An opinion in the room
Of course the minutes add the ubiquitous caveat that the decision on transfer 'lies in the hands of the Scottish ministers', but there in black and white is the government line; it's not a policy but it does represent an opinion.
Mr Rammell confirmed on the Today programme this morning that the minutes were accurate. 'I was responding to the Libyan Europe minister's concern about dying in prison,' he said.
'In specific response to that concern I said we were not actively seeking his death in prison but would not and could not intervene in a decision that was for Scottish ministers.'
After facing calls to 'come clean' about London's involvement in the release of Megrahi (pictured right), Brown finally faced up to some of the music in a prepared statement issued before a speech at a youth jobs summit in Birmingham.
There he insisted that there had been 'no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double dealing and no private assurances'.
'A decision about the fate of Megrahi was solely a matter for the Scottish government. I could not intervene in a matter that was a quasi-judicial matter for the Scottish government,' he elaborated.
'Our interest throughout has been to strengthen the coalition against international terrorism. For us, there was never a link between any other issue [read: oil] and Scotland's decision about Megrahi's fate.
'There was no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double dealing... no private assurances by me to Col Gaddafi. This was a decision for the Scottish government.'
Getting it all wrong
There's no reason to doubt this; I don't suspect the government of pressurising its Scottish counterpart, no great friend of theirs, to release Megrahi for anything, let alone oil dollars.
But what still doesn't make sense, and will probably never be cleared up despite David Cameron's farcical calls for a public inquiry, is why No 10 was so reluctant to react to Megrahi's release, save deploring the hero's welcome he received in Tripoli.
International relations are fraught with complexities that politicians such as Cameron and MacAskill cannot grasp, and despite insisting at only conversing with Gaddafi once over Megrahi, Brown has hinted at the behind-the-scenes talks since the bomber was released.
'Would it have been right to have spoken publicly about the issue before the decision when it was a matter for the Scottish government? No, we would have been wrong to intervene when it was a quasi judicial decision for the Scottish government,' he said today.
'After the decision was made, and after the despicable scenes at Tripoli airport, was I right to use my energies to minimise further unnecessary suffering for the relatives of Lockerbie victims and to prevent Libyan independence day being made into a celebration of Megrahi's return? Yes, and as we saw yesterday, he did not appear at those events.'
Quite what 'my energies' refers to is not clear, but attempts to prevent 'further unnecessary suffering' of the Lockerbie families have failed; Downing St's handling of Megrahi's release was bungled.
In trying to retain an air of dignified silence despite clearly getting its desired outcome and getting a hostile national government to take the hit on the difficult decision, the government has prolonged the agony of relatives who watched the only person ever convicted of their loved ones' murders given a rapturous reception by keeping the story in the headlines for the last fortnight.
Maybe next time it might just be better to say what you think?
The views expressed on inthenews.co.uk's comment pages are not necessarily those of the website or its owners.
By Matthew Champion.
First Brown remained stoically silent on the release on compassionate grounds of Abdelbaset Ali Al Megrahi.
Everyone wanted to know what the prime minister thought about the decision, which, as we all know - since it has been drummed into our ears until they bleed - was made solely by the Scottish executive and more specifically its justice secretary Kenny MacAskill.
In No 10 this was thought sufficient a reason for Brown to avoid commenting on the issue, but Conservative complaints that the prime minister had been quicker to wax lyrical about Jade Goody, Susan Boyle and England's Ashes victory were, for once, justified.
Did Gordon Brown kill Jade Goody? Did he subject Susan Boyle to the scrutiny of a global TV audience despite her fragile mental state? Did he take the crucial wickets that saw Australia defeated in the final Ashes Test?
He didn't decide any of these events but he told people what he thought about them, so why couldn't the PM do the same when Megrahi was released eight years into a life sentence for the murder of 270 people on board Pan Am flight 103 in 1988?
It's not as if he didn't have an opinion, a chain of events started with the publication of letters on the website of the Scottish executive, as well as the Ministry of Justice and Foreign and Commonwealth Office, last night proved that.
Minutes of a meeting between Scottish and Libyan officials earlier this year showed that the Libyan delegation claimed to have been told by Foreign Office minister Bill Rammell that 'neither the prime minister nor the foreign secretary would want Mr Megrahi to pass away in prison'.
An opinion in the room
Of course the minutes add the ubiquitous caveat that the decision on transfer 'lies in the hands of the Scottish ministers', but there in black and white is the government line; it's not a policy but it does represent an opinion.
Mr Rammell confirmed on the Today programme this morning that the minutes were accurate. 'I was responding to the Libyan Europe minister's concern about dying in prison,' he said.
'In specific response to that concern I said we were not actively seeking his death in prison but would not and could not intervene in a decision that was for Scottish ministers.'
After facing calls to 'come clean' about London's involvement in the release of Megrahi (pictured right), Brown finally faced up to some of the music in a prepared statement issued before a speech at a youth jobs summit in Birmingham.
There he insisted that there had been 'no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double dealing and no private assurances'.
'A decision about the fate of Megrahi was solely a matter for the Scottish government. I could not intervene in a matter that was a quasi-judicial matter for the Scottish government,' he elaborated.
'Our interest throughout has been to strengthen the coalition against international terrorism. For us, there was never a link between any other issue [read: oil] and Scotland's decision about Megrahi's fate.
'There was no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double dealing... no private assurances by me to Col Gaddafi. This was a decision for the Scottish government.'
Getting it all wrong
There's no reason to doubt this; I don't suspect the government of pressurising its Scottish counterpart, no great friend of theirs, to release Megrahi for anything, let alone oil dollars.
But what still doesn't make sense, and will probably never be cleared up despite David Cameron's farcical calls for a public inquiry, is why No 10 was so reluctant to react to Megrahi's release, save deploring the hero's welcome he received in Tripoli.
International relations are fraught with complexities that politicians such as Cameron and MacAskill cannot grasp, and despite insisting at only conversing with Gaddafi once over Megrahi, Brown has hinted at the behind-the-scenes talks since the bomber was released.
'Would it have been right to have spoken publicly about the issue before the decision when it was a matter for the Scottish government? No, we would have been wrong to intervene when it was a quasi judicial decision for the Scottish government,' he said today.
'After the decision was made, and after the despicable scenes at Tripoli airport, was I right to use my energies to minimise further unnecessary suffering for the relatives of Lockerbie victims and to prevent Libyan independence day being made into a celebration of Megrahi's return? Yes, and as we saw yesterday, he did not appear at those events.'
Quite what 'my energies' refers to is not clear, but attempts to prevent 'further unnecessary suffering' of the Lockerbie families have failed; Downing St's handling of Megrahi's release was bungled.
In trying to retain an air of dignified silence despite clearly getting its desired outcome and getting a hostile national government to take the hit on the difficult decision, the government has prolonged the agony of relatives who watched the only person ever convicted of their loved ones' murders given a rapturous reception by keeping the story in the headlines for the last fortnight.
Maybe next time it might just be better to say what you think?
The views expressed on inthenews.co.uk's comment pages are not necessarily those of the website or its owners.
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