"Justice Undone"

Comments on the U.S. Senate Report
December 21 2010
last update December 23

I've been not posting much here in recent days, but being the 22nd anniversary of the destruction of Pan Am 103, it's a day to say something. I didn't know what until I just saw this report from MSNBC regarding the long-awaited U.S. Senate report on al-Megrahi's release. This was issued today, to mark the anniversary for maximum effect. Senator Memendez and crew are playing hardball here, with the title also meant to be punchy: Justice Undone: The Release of the Lockerbie Bomber. (report PDF link)

I'll have to read the report before critiquing it (space reserved below for a later update). But the release of Megrahi was not "Jusice undone." Even if you call the verdict "justice," which might be legally true if not really, the legal technicality of his conviction still stands and serves its key purpose for U.S. foreign policy of keeping the real truth legally barred from beiing followed up on.

Justice was undone many years ago, when at an unclear date (sometime in 1989) a decision was made to deny the truth of the attack and pursue strange new clues that started appearing. The injustice of framing a different nation, nd two men within it in particular, was set in stone in November 1991 with indictments against al-Megrahi and "accomplice" Fhimah - charges laced with what we now know are lies (brown suitcase on Malta, explosives at the airport, 1986 report on bombing a plane, at least, all legally dismissed). The final nail in Justice's coffin was hammered in a decade later at Camp Zeist, when the judges accepteed enough of the bogus case to convict one of the two accused.

Commentary
For now I'll just pass on my comment at the MSNBC article, modified slightly for better effect

"Unrepentant terrorist" is apparently code for someone who maintains his innocence, which is in turn strongly supported, not by the verdict, but by the facts - both the ones before the judges and withheld from them.

Megrahi is an "unrepentant terrorist" not on Malta November 23, the day the clothes in the bomb suitcase were purchased there by man 4 inches taller and 14 years older and of different appearance from himself (so says Tony Gauci's only reliable evidence). Only one questionable scrap of paper, with no corroboration and contradicted by everything else, even suggests there was a bomb on Malta Dec 21, while Megrahi was there under an alias. If one accepts the court's judgment on Megrahi's guilt, why ignore their ruling that he had no legally accepted accomplice, when one was clearly needed? There was a dismissed star witness (Giaka) with a handful of juicy clues found "unreliable," and a back-up star witness (Gauci) whose stories changed in all key regards by trial (since the suspect changed). There are questions over the most crucial physical evidence, at least two multi-million-dollar pay-outs to liars, and a string of bollocks stories from Bollier. And finally, a heap of clues still pointing to an Iranian hand, not a Libyan one, behind the attack and to an English, not Maltese, point of departure for the bomb. (see around the site for details on these underreported facts)

If legal technicalities of conviction or acquittal were all that mattered here, I could see being upset by the early release. But knowing what I do of the actual facts, and that the release only happened after his appeal was safely surrendered, I'm still too mad about other things.

Menendez: ""God forbid there should be another terrorist attack."

Hey, dummy! Megrahi had just gotten in jail when 9/11 happened (ironic side-note - with Libya the first nation, even before this, to target bin Laden and al Qaeda as a dangerous element). Megrahi's accepted guilt stops nothing except the truth about Lockerbie coming out (so far). You of all people are probably aware of that, and hence will never stop your crusade to keep the hex on Libya. Unless...

Mad that a convicted terrorist is free? Then help us revive that appeal and clear his name so an innocent man can die in peace and his family can move out from under that shadow. Sound good?

Review of the report
forthcoming...

No, never mind. I'm too busy to read through this piece of crap. I'll let a few others speak on it, via these articles linked on Professor Black's blog The Lockerbie Case.
This Lockerbie bomber nonsense shows US senators have lost the plot
excerpt:

...the cause of the bereaved would have been served better had the senators steered clear of this elaborate conspiracy theory.

'Bonkers' US claim on bomber
excerpt:

[SNP] MSP Stewart Maxwell said: "It is bonkers. It is an absolute work of ill-informed fiction.

"They started off making wild claims about BP lobbying for the release of Megrahi and end up making the most bizarre allegations about the Sainsbury's buyout.

"This report is a piece of politically motivated propaganda that lets down all those who worked long and hard to see justice done in the Lockerbie case."

And "Blogiston's" comment from the second one:

Having now read the report - the subtext is really, ageing imperialist nation on the verge of bankruptcy accuses small friendly nation of corrupt practices and attempts to override its internal judicial process.
Meanwhile, it is impotent to curtail a real and growing threat from emerging east Asian countries with global ambitions who ARE making corrupt deals, refusing to acknowledge human rights, ignoring undemocratic regimes, disregarding environmental issues, on EVERY continent.
American foreign policy (which is governed solely by its own domestic expediency including global commercial interests) does not project overseas to become local domestic policy, anymore - but they ain't assimilating the new data yet, are they?
We should just ignore them now, and move on, because they would hate that - but internal cat-fighting locally will stop that happening, of course.