A number of other papers have picked up the report in yesterday’s Times that the Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, had £1.8 million in a Swiss bank account at the time of his conviction eight years ago. The information, as the Times with remarkable understatement observes, tends to cast doubt on Libya’s contention that Megrahi was merely a low-ranking airline worker.
Furthermore, it has emerged that the Scottish prosecuting authority, the Crown Office, refused bail to Megrahi only a year ago, for fear that he would try to gain access to the money.
The information casts still further doubt on the wisdom of the Scottish justice minister, Kenny MacAskill, in deciding to free the terrorist on compassionate grounds last August.
It is to be hoped that Mr MacAskill, who put on a particularly pompous, grandstanding performance when announcing Megrahi’s release last summer, will break into his Christmas vacation and explain to the families of the 270 victims of the outrage why he did not make the existence of Mr Megrahi’s nest egg public a lot sooner.
If Mr Jones (or anyone for that matter) can please furnish us all with the documents, evidence, statements or any other source which states that anyone involved in this whole tragedy (including the court at Zeist) was ever under the impression that Megrahi was anything other than a fairly high-ranking member of Lybian Intelligence, it would be a welcome revelation. I will not hold my breath…