Officials in Westminster and the Crown Office are still arguing about what information should or should not be shared with the public and politicians are fighting over each other to say I told you so.
Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi is still alive. The man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing is still sharing in the world’s oxygen supply and there are many who wish he were not. Later this week or this month those politicians are bound to call for the resignation of the minister who released Megrahi exactly three months ago.
Kenny MacAskill, the Justice Secretary, released Megrahi on August 20 on compassionate grounds because he is dying. The guidelines suggest that those prisoners with a life expectancy of three months or less should be considered for such a move.
Mr MacAskill had nothing to gain and much to lose yet he chose compassion over retribution. The UK Government had a great deal to gain from the Prisoner Transfer Agreement (PTA) signed off between Westminster and Libya earlier this year. When I interviewed Saif Gaddafi in August he made clear that the deal was all about oil and money.
Although Mr MacAskill rejected the PTA, scores of people in the US threatened to boycott Scotland and its exports.
Those with a sense of perspective praised the decision of Scotland in the face of condemnation from the US and a chilling silence from Westminster.
Even they may now question the decision of Mr MacAskill, but where is the consistency in praising compassion for a man with only three months to live, and criticising compassion for a man who lives for three months and two weeks?
Megrahi is desperately ill but he is still alive. Imagine that now he is back with family in Tripoli he may live for four or five months. Should our patience with compassion run out so quickly that we begin to wish him dead?
Would it not be more constructive at this stage to support the living in finding answers to what happened to their loved ones?
Rather than calling for the resignation of the Justice Secretary, should we not focus on the way forward. Without knowing the truth about the past the path forward will always seem uncertain.
We must allow the relatives a public inquiry to deal with the questions from the past and leave the ghoulish spectacle of a man dying in Libya alone to allow him to spend his few remaining days in peace.
Vying to be the most outspoken, punitive, secretive or draconian does nothing for Scotland’s international reputation. We need to show that compassion is not just for Christmas and that openness and transparency from those still refusing to share vital information, will not be tolerated.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article