The papers shed new light on the August 2009 release of al-Megrahi from a Scottish prison, a move that strained relations between Britain and Washington. Scotland's autonomous government has insisted that it allowed al-Megrahi to return to Libya on compassionate grounds after he was diagnosed with terminal prostate cancer. He is still alive today, despite being given only three months to live at the time of his release.
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Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, left, who was found guilty of the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, and Seif al-Islam Gadhafi, son of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, gesture upon al-Megrahi's arrival in Tripoli in 2009.
A flurry of reports from U.S. diplomats in London and Tripoli detail the pressures placed on British officials by Libya, including threats from the country's "thuggish" leader, Moammar Gadhafi, and "a parade of treats" for the Scottish government if it authorized a release. The Scottish government turned down all of the "treats," the cables report.
"The consequences for the U.K.-Libya bilateral relationship would be 'dire' were al-Megrahi to die in Scottish prison," Gene Cretz, U.S. ambassador to Libya, wrote in a January 2009 cable. "Specific threats have included the immediate cessation of all U.K. commercial activity in Libya, a diminishment or severing of political ties and demonstrations against official U.K. facilities."
Cretz, who based his cables on discussions with British officials, wrote that members of the Libyan government had also "implied ... that the welfare of U.K. diplomats and citizens in Libya would be at risk." He continued, "Consequences if al-Megrahi were to die in prison or if the transfer under the [prisoner transfer agreement] were denied would be harsh, immediate and not easily remedied."
The British government in London has consistently argued that the decision to free al-Megrahi was made entirely by the independent Scottish government. And the leaked cables contain no suggestion that the administration in Edinburgh was secretly doing London's bidding.
However, the papers do imply that British interests were served by al-Megrahi's release. In August 2009, the Tripoli embassy noted that then British Prime Minister Tony Blair's visit to Libya in 2007 may have been linked to lucrative oil and gas trade deals. "Rumors that Blair made linkages between Megrahi's release and trade deals have been longstanding among embassy contacts," the paper read. "The U.K. ambassador in Tripoli categorically denied the claims."
And when it became clear that al-Megrahi would be freed on compassionate grounds, the U.K. ambassador in Tripoli, Vincent Fean, "expressed relief," an August 2009 cable reports. "He noted that a refusal of Megrahi's request could have had disastrous implications for British interests in Libya. 'They could have cut us off at the knees,' Fean bluntly said."
Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister, told BBC radio this morning that the leaked dispatches "vindicated" Scotland's position. It showed "we weren't interested in threats, we weren't interested in blandishments, we were interested in Scots justice," he said.
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Jack Straw, U.K. justice secretary at the time of al-Megrahi's release, agreed that the leaks supported the official line put out by the administrations in London and Edinburgh. "Both Alex Salmond and the British government have said until they're blue in the face what is true: That this was a decision which was made by the Scottish government, and by nobody else," he told the BBC. "And they did it on the basis of their law and their practice so far as the release of people in serious medical conditions on compassionate grounds."
Al-Megrahi, a former Libyan intelligence agent, is the only person ever sentenced in connection with the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, which exploded over the small Scottish town of Lockerbie in December 1988, killing 270 people. He was convicted in 2001 of 270 counts of murder for masterminding the attack.