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Paying tribute to the powerful: Gordon Brown's gift to Libya
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British Prime Minister Gordon Brown,right, and British
Defense Secretary Bob Ainsworth at the
International Institute for Strategic Studies in London.
(AP Photo/ Shaun Curry, Pool)
After the devolved Scottish judiciary recently chose to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the alleged Lockerbie bomber, questions were immediately asked of Britain’s involvement in the decision, reports the Economist. Choosing to free a man who’d initially been handed a life sentence for the UK’s worst-ever terrorist attack (the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland) has aroused not only the suspicions but also the ire of various stakeholders. The United States is predictably enraged, not only because 189 of the 270 victims were American citizens, but also possibly because, as the world’s premier superpower, it was unable to exert enough of an influence over the Scottish executive’s actions. In the buildup to Megrahi’s release, US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton warned, as quoted by the Economist, that it would be “absolutely wrong” to sanction his return to Libya. Later, head of the FBI, Robert Mueller, responded to news of the controversial decision by accusing the semi-autonomous Scottish of making “a mockery of justice,” reports the BBC.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown insists that Scotland independently chose to free the suspected terrorist. He’s even revealed that when he spoke to the Libyan leader at the fringes of the G8 summit in Italy this year, he told him Megrahi’s release was entirely dependent on the Scottish judiciary. But it took the beleaguered Brown a good week to even release a statement, his silence on the matter only exacerbated by the decision to publicly air his opinion on England’s victory over Australia in the Ashes cricket tournament. Opposition leader and “foreshadowed” prime minister, David Cameron, wrote an article for the Times in which he called the Scottish justice secretary’s actions “completely inappropriate” and Gordon Brown’s failure to speak up as indicative of his lack of “a basic requirement of leadership.” In letters leaked to the Sunday Times, British Justice Secretary Jack Straw in 2007 advised his Scottish counterpart that “in the overwhelming interests of the United Kingdom,” Megrahi should be taken into consideration when working out the Prisoner Transfer Agreement between Libya and the UK. It has also emerged that this attempt to secure the Lockerbie bomber’s release was around the same time that Libya and British oil giant, BP, were locked in tense negotiations over a multi-billion pound oil exploration contract. Although Megrahi, suffering from terminal cancer, was eventually returned to Libya on compassionate grounds and not as part of the Prisoner Transfer Agreement, Cameron has accused the British government of compromising its values. He said that, by even suggesting that Megrahi, a convicted terrorist, “could be used as makeweight for trade,” the government has crossed a line that was meant to mark its stance on terrorism.
Cameron, head of the Conservative party, is apparently more concerned with the damage the incident has done to Britain’s reputation and to its relationship with its biggest ally, the United States, than he is with the fate of British-Libyan commercial ties. The Americans must also be questioning Britain’s obvious desire to appease Libya’s leader, the megalomaniacal Muammar Gadhafi. Although advocating a more “holistic” approach to counterterrorism policy, the Obama administration is still bold enough to incorporate some of the tactics used by the hawkish Bush administration, says Steven Simon of the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). It was the older Bush, in fact, who in 1991, 3 years after the Lockerbie disaster, ordered Libya “to surrender for trial all of those charged with the crime; accept responsibility for the actions of Libyan officials; disclose all it knows of the crime, including the names of all those responsible; and allow full access to all witnesses, documents and other material evidence.” Although, as reported by CFR, these conditions were gradually amended by European countries keen on improving their trade relations with Libya, the United States’ agenda was enough of a factor that the UN was forced to impose sanctions on the North African nation a year later, and only suspended trade and travel restrictions in 1999 when Gadhafi turned over two suspects, including Megrahi. And of course in 1986, the Reagan administration, unwilling to negotiate with an increasingly truculent state sponsor of terrorism, bombed the Libyan capital to get its point across; not since Wheelus Air Base was seized from Italian colonizers and administered by allied forces during World War II had U.S. fighter jets so had their way in the skies over Tripoli.
Only two weeks before David Cameron’s article referred to Westminster’s stance on Megrahi as “a betrayal of everything that Britain stands for,” Gordon Brown’s government had flexed its withering muscles to bring the self-rule of the tiny Turks and Caicos islands to an abrupt end, reports the Economist. The Caribbean nation, officially known as a British Overseas Territory, had its elected leaders removed and its constitution almost completely suspended. It came after an inquiry by former British judge Sir Robin Auld, which reported that there was a “high probability of systemic corruption” in the islands’ government. Apparently, Britain had little choice but to replace the elected premier with a representative of Queen Elizabeth.
Coming in the wake of the British parliament’s expenses scandal, it seems audacious at best that Gordon Brown’s Labour government should attempt to police politics on the international stage. At worst, it’s a bit pathetic that, facing an imminent loss of authority, they should assert themselves in such a manner. They might next try invading Libya to prove to the world they weren’t simply paying tribute to Gadhafi by authorizing the release of Megrahi, but that obviously wouldn’t be an option. The tactless Silvio Berlusconi is more likely to re-colonize Libya or, for that matter, to march into London and claim Britain back in the name of Caesar than Gordon Brown is to make a realistic attempt at winning back power.
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