MacAskill claims Iranians and others responsible for Lockerbie bombing

The former Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill has claimed terrorists from Libya, Syria, Iran and Palestine were behind the 1988 Lockerbie Bombing and that his opposite number at Westminster, Jack Straw, admitted oil interests were the reason for a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya, The Herald reports.

In a new book entitled The Lockerbie Bombing: The Search For Justice, to be published later this month, Mr MacAskill argues that the UK government entered into a “Faustian Pact” with Libya as part of Tony Blair’s “deal in the desert” with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2007.

Mr MacAskill writes that in a telephone call with Mr Straw he was told the Libyans “would not accept a PTA (Prison Transfer Arrangement) that specifically excluded Megrahi… he then went on to explain the crux of the matter as he saw it, which was British interests. A commercial deal for development of Libyan oil and other resources in the south of that country was of potentially huge financial benefit. The UK was very eager to secure the deal for BP, but it was dependent on the PTA”.

As the deal was being agreed Mr Megrahi was diagnosed with terminal cancer and was released on compassionate grounds in 2009.

But Mr Straw has called the comments “highly embroidered”, while former First Minister Alex Salmond said his government “played the whole thing with a straight bat from start to finish”.

A spokesperson for oil giant BP said it had no comment on the UK government’s discussions.

An SNP spokesman meanwhile said Mr Megrahi’s release was made solely on medical grounds: “Political, economic and diplomatic considerations played no part in the SNP government’s decision.

“The same cannot be said of the UK Labour government, which cosied up to Gaddafi and his regime when Jack Straw was in charge of the Foreign Office.”

Robert Black QC, architect of the Camp Zeist trial which saw Mr Megrahi convicted, said the book contains no mention of the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission’s six grounds on which the conviction might have amounted to a miscarriage of justice.

Dr Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was one of those killed, said: “I have no doubt that they were trying to do what has been revealed by Kenny MacAskill, and that is to secure oil reserves in Libya for BP through the agreement of the prisoner transfer.

“It was all orchestrated for commercial reasons.”

He added: “I am pleased to see Mr MacAskill outline his view on who was really responsible for the Lockerbie bombing, as it is clear to me it was carried out by the Iranians and Palestinian factions in response to the downing of an Iranian airbus by the USS Vincennes in 1988.”