Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) wants more proof from Libyan officials to back up their claims that Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi is too incapacitated to be turned over to the U.S. government.
The Libyan National Transitional Council, or NTC, last night said al-Megrahi is in a coma and they have no intention of turning over the convicted terrorist.
“This wouldn’t be the first time that Libyan officials claimed al-Megrahi was on his death bed,” Schumer said. “We’re going to need a lot more verification than the word of local Libyan officials. There is no justifiable basis for the rebels’ decision to shield this convicted terrorist.”
The former Libyan intelligence officer convicted in the 1988 Lockerbie plane bombing is on his deathbed, drifting in and out of consciousness, his family said and Libyan officials confirmed, just one week after Muammar Qaddafi was ousted from power.
Al-Megrahi was the only person convicted for the bombing of the Pan Am flight over Lockerbie, Scotland, which killed 270 people, including many American college students coming home for Christmas. He was released from a Scottish prison in 2009, eight years into serving a life sentence because his doctors said he would likely die of prostate cancer within three months.
The Obama administration has asked leaders of the transitional government to consider handing al-Megrahi over to U.S. authorities if he doesn’t die in the meantime.
“This is a guy with blood on his hands, the lives of innocents. Libya itself under Qaddafi made a hero of this guy. Presumably, a new, free, democratic Libya would have a different attitude toward a convicted terrorist,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told reporters.
But a Scottish government official contends that only his administration can demand al-Megrahi’s extradition — and that it doesn’t plan on doing so.
First Minister Alex Salmond, head of the semi-autonomous Scottish government, said Americans calling for al-Megrahi’s return to jail should simply let the bomber “die in peace.”
After his release in 2009, Americans speculated that the British move was designed to curry favor with oil-rich Libya.
The NTC’s Justice Minister Mohammed al-Alagi told journalists in Tripoli Sunday that as of now no Libyans would be deported.
“We will not hand over any Libyan citizen. It was Qaddafi who handed over Libyan citizens,” he said.
But he shifted his stance a bit on Monday, saying the decision to release al-Megrahi was made by a “sovereign government” that had not requested his return, and said these extradition decisions would be dealt with only after a new Libyan government was firmly established.
“We are in the process of liberating Libya and rebuilding it anew,” he said. “Dealing with this issue will fall to a national elected government.”
Information Minister Mahmoud Shammam was even more nuanced, conceding that the issue “is very important to some of our Western allies” and noting that it would be handled according to “international rules and standards.”
