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Britain 'against Lockerbie bomber dying in jail'


Britain did not want the Lockerbie bomber to die in prison, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said Wednesday, while insisting London did not pressure the Scottish government The Scottish Government (SG) (Scottish Gaelic: Riaghaltas na h-Alba) is the executive arm of government of Scotland. It was established in 1999 as the Scottish Executive  over the issue.

"We did not want him to die in prison .. we weren't seeking his death in prison," he told BBC BBC
 in full British Broadcasting Corp.

Publicly financed broadcasting system in Britain. A private company at its founding in 1922, it was replaced by a public corporation under royal charter in 1927.
 radio, while again denying there was a deal with Libya to release Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi.

"The allegation The assertion, claim, declaration, or statement of a party to an action, setting out what he or she expects to prove.

If the allegations in a plaintiff's complaint are insufficient to establish that the person's legal rights have been violated, the defendant can make a
 that is being made ... is that somehow we pressured the Scottish government into making a decision one way or another," he said, insisting: "There was no pressure from the British government on the Scots."

His admission that Britain did not want the former Libyan agent to die behind bars comes nearly two weeks after his release from a Scottish jail on compassionate com·pas·sion·ate  
adj.
1. Feeling or showing compassion; sympathetic. See Synonyms at humane.

2. Granted to an individual because of an emergency or other unusual circumstances:
 grounds, because he is dying of prostate cancer prostate cancer, cancer originating in the prostate gland. Prostate cancer is the leading malignancy in men in the United States and is second only to lung cancer as a cause of cancer death in men. .

The comments are likely to increase pressure on British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, whose government has insisted that the decision to release Megrahi was one solely taken by the semi-autonomous Scottish government.

On Tuesday documents were released by the British and Scottish governments List of Scottish Governments is a list of all Scottish Government (formerly Scottish Executive) ministerial teams which have existed, since the introduction of political autonomy for Scotland in 1999.  about the case, which London hoped would counter charges that Megrahi was released as part of a deal to facilitate a huge oil and gas deal with oil-rich Libya.

Miliband insisted there was no deal with Tripoli Tripoli, city, Lebanon
Tripoli (trĭp`əlē) or Tarabulus (täräb`l
, noting that Brown made this clear in a meeting with Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi in July this year.

"He was absolutely clear in his meeting with Colonel Kadhafi that he could not instruct, and he could not give comfort about the Megrahi (case) .. there was no way for us to control Megrahi's fate," said the foreign minister.

"At no stage were we willing to say that we could offer the kind of deal that is being alleged, because it was not in our gift to release Megrahi," he added.

Megrahi, the only person to be convicted of the murder of 270 people in the bombing of a Pan Am jet over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988, served eight years of a life sentence before being released on August 20.
Copyright 2009 AFP Global Edition
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
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Author:AFP
Publication:AFP Global Edition
Date:Sep 2, 2009
Words:350
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