No doubt you remember this:
Still protesting his innocence and offering “sincere sympathy” to the families of those who died in the bombing, Mr. Megrahi was granted his freedom under the terms of Scottish laws permitting the early release of prisoners with less than three months to live. The Scottish authorities and his lawyers say he has terminal prostate cancer.
Well, 3 months ago Mr. Megrahi outlived his prognosis.
Three months after the release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the families of American victims of the Lockerbie bombing have reignited a row over the medical advice that allowed him to be freed early from his 27-year sentence.
Megrahi was released on compassionate grounds from prison in Greenock on 20 August after the Scottish justice minister, Kenny MacAskill, received advice that he was terminally ill with prostate cancer. It was said that the Libyan, who was convicted of carrying out the bombing, only had three months to live.
Now we learn (via jswtx on Twitter) that he’s not only living but living in luxury. (memeorandum)
Megrahi, is now living in a spacious two-storey villa with his wife and their five grown-up children in a prosperous suburb of Tripoli, the Libyan capital.
Well we can hope that his next residence doesn’t have a working air conditioner and that he finds himself there soon.
Shortly after Megrahi’s release Barry Rubin observed:
Finally, and most intriguingly, is the ease of fooling–and thus making fools–of the West. Significant here is the op-ed piece by a high Libyan official in a major U.S. newspaper, denying that he had received a hero’s welcome (the same treatment as a hero that Lebanese and Syrian leaders gave recently to another terrorist who murdered civilians in cold blood).
Incidentally, how many media outlets pointed out the fact that the released prisoner was merely an intelligence officer who took his orders from Qadhafi himself? When a high-ranking intelligence officer is convicted of terrorism, it means that state-sponsored terrorism is going on. Qadhafi has the blood of those 270 Lockerbie victims on his hands.
A some of us were not fooled, but I think Megrahi’s currently comfortable circumstances testify to his value to Qadhafi and stand as a reminder that Qadhafi has not moderated.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
