This just happened in Saudi Arabia:

A 10-year-old bride was returned last Sunday to her 80-year-old husband by her father who discovered her at the home of her aunt with whom she has been hiding for around 10 days. A Saudi local newspaper said the husband, who denies he is 80 in spite of claims by the girl’s family, accused the aunt of meddling in his affairs. “My marriage is not against Shariah. It included the elements of acceptance and response by the father of the bride,” he said. He added that he had been engaged to his wife’s elder sister and that this broke off as she wanted to continue with her education. “In light of this, her father offered his younger daughter. I was allowed to have a look at her according to Shariah and found her acceptable,” he said.

It now appears that the medical advice providing the pretext for the release of  al-Megrahi is suspect.

This from The Scotsman:

JUSTICE secretary Kenny MacAskill was last night under pressure to reveal more details of the medical evidence that led to the release of the Lockerbie bomber, after it emerged that only one doctor was willing to say Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi had less than three months to live.

Labour and Conservative politicians have demanded the Scottish Government publish details of the doctor’s expertise and qualifications, amid suggestions he or she may not have been a prostate cancer expert.

The parties have also raised questions over whether the doctor was employed by the Libyan government or Megrahi’s legal team, which could have influenced the judgment.

The evidence provided by the doctor is crucial as compassionate release under Scots law requires that a prisoner has less than three months to live.

Doubts about Megrahi’s life expectancy have already been raised by American relatives of the 270 victims of the bomb that blew up Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie on 21 December, 1988. But last night the Scottish Government said it would not publish details of the individual who gave the crucial advice…

The report suggests that only one doctor was willing to support the claim that Megrahi had just weeks to live…

And suggestions that the doctor who gave the prognosis may have been employed by the Libyan government emerged in the report’s notes. It said that a professor from Libya had been involved in Megrahi’s care and the medical officer who wrote the report had been “working with clinicians from Libya over the past ten months”…

Did you know they have really great doctors in Libya, far better than any Scottish oncologists that could be found?

Even these super-experts took ten months to make their prognosis. But eventually one was clear that the mass-murderer had only three months to live, so Heartbreak Kenny could at last sob out that the poor pitiable creature was free to go home.

As we have explained below (Mocking the victims of Lockerbie), Qaddafi himself orders every act of terrorism carried out by Libyans. Qaddafi is the mass murderer. But British, European and American diplomats are on the best of terms with him.

Of Libya under Qaddafi’s totalitarian dictatorship, Michael J. Totten writes at Commentary’s ‘contentions’ website (read it all here):

The place stinks of oppression. You can’t escape the state without leaving the country or going off-road and into the desert. Informers and secret police are omnipresent and all but omniscient. Hotel rooms are bugged. No one can travel from one city to another without a thick stack of permits and papers. I saw propaganda posters and billboards literally everywhere, even alongside roads in the wilderness where nobody lived. State propaganda is even carved into the sides of the mountains. Pictures of Qaddafi hang inside every building, and an entire floor of the museum in the capital is dedicated to glorifying him personally. Libya even looks like a communist country, with its Stalinist tower blocks outside Tripoli’s old city center and its socialist-realist paintings depicting happy proletarians in their Workers’ Paradise.

No one I met would talk about politics if there was the slightest chance anyone might overhear us. Those who did open up when we were safely in private were unanimous in their hatred, fear, and loathing of the regime. And they made sure to tell me that their entire families would be thrown in prison if I repeated what they said to anyone.

I visited several bookstores and found only four types of books in two genres: the Koran, commentaries on the Koran, Qaddafi’s Green Book and other works supposedly authored by him, and state-approved commentaries on his manifestos. If other genres were in circulation—fiction, poetry, economics, history—I couldn’t find them. And I quickly gave up trying to locate an international newspaper or any other source of information that didn’t belong to Qaddafi…

In an article by the admirable John Bolton (read it all here) about the release of al-Megrahi, the convicted Lockerbie bomber, we find this :

The state department said on Friday that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton worked “for weeks and months” to persuade Britain not to release the murderer.

As we have learnt that foreign offices, which are dedicated to promoting the interests of foreigners, are very unlikely to tell the truth, we do not believe that Hillary Clinton did anything of the kind.

But we do believe the implication of what the State Department is claiming without apparently realizing what they’re saying: that the release  of al-Megrahi was under discussion for ‘weeks and months’, and that Hillary Clinton knew about it and may have been party to the secret negotiations.

Now they’re pretending that the government of Scotland was not informed of Tony Blair’s ‘prisoner transfer agreement’ with Qaddafi; that the Scottish administration was ‘furious’ when they found out about it ‘from prison service officials’, and would never have let al-Megrahi go had it not been for the compassionate ‘instincts’ of their Justice Secretary when the news of the bomber’s fatal illness came to him.  But reading between the lines one can see clearly enough that the Scots were pressured by Blair and Brown and only needed an excuse  to release al-Megrahi – the only Libyan prisoner in Britain.

Alan Cochrane writes in the Telegraph:

It increasingly appears as if Prime Minister Brown and Foreign Secretary David Miliband are content to allow the SNP [Scottish National Party] administration to take the flak over this issue [the release of the Lockerbie bomber] as part of a greater game to help secure British and American access to the Libyan oil and gas fields. Miliband has attacked this suggestion as a “slur”, but aren’t his words just so much hot air? Saif Gaddafi, the Libyan dictator’s son, has said that a trade agreement with Britain was part of the deal done to secure Megrahi’s release, and this newspaper reveals today that relations between Saif and Lord Mandelson are much closer than the Business Secretary has admitted.

To the rest of the world, the British Government is shrugging its shoulders and confessing its horror at the scenes at Tripoli airport – which we’re told that Gordon Brown tried to forestall. But as to whether Megrahi should have been released in the first place, there was not a word from Brown, or any other Government minister.

We’re told that they didn’t want to be seen to be influencing the decision of a devolved administration. But Labour ministers in London argue with the Nationalists in Edinburgh on an almost daily basis, over matters as mundane as the council tax and who’s to pay for a new Forth Road Bridge. Why not on such an important issue as the release of the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing?

What is perhaps not widely understood is that the process behind Megrahi’s release began not with Alex Salmond’s devolved SNP administration in Edinburgh, but with the Labour government in London – or, more specifically, with Tony Blair. It was the then prime minister who brokered a secret prisoner transfer agreement with Gaddafi, as part of a general thawing of relations between the West and this former rogue state. It was linked to suggestions that massive new British, American and European investment in Libya’s vast oil and gas fields would be forthcoming if only the Libyans would mend their ways. The small matter of the Lockerbie bomber was a fly in the ointment.

Blair didn’t inform the authorities in Edinburgh of his deal, even though they were responsible for Megrahi’s conviction and incarceration. [?] Salmond and the independent Scottish law officers only found out about it when they were tipped off by senior prison service officials.[?]  Downing Street then compounded the original error by trying to pretend that the deal done with Gaddafi did not concern Megrahi, even though he was the only Libyan held in any British jail.

Eventually, after furious protests from the Scots, Jack Straw, the justice secretary, was forced to issue a statement conceding that any decision on the Lockerbie bomber’s future was indeed a matter for Scottish ministers. But the damage, in terms of relations between the two administrations, had been done. [?] Although the formalities over a prisoner transfer for Megrahi continued, the Scottish authorities, still smarting over Blair’s behaviour, were now firmly against such a move [?] – until it became known that Megrahi was suffering from terminal cancer, and a release on compassionate grounds became an option. Those close to MacAskill reported that he was looking favourably on such a move; given that his instincts [!] on the matter were well known in Downing Street and the Foreign Office [!?], they sat tight, said nothing [?] and waited for the release to take place.

The protests coming out of the British Foreign Office, the British government, and the government of Scotland that they had nothing to do with the release of al-Megrahi (see posts below) ring hollow. Especially the denials of the Business Secretary, Peter Mandelson –  a buddy of Qaddafi’s son, Seif al-Islam – are unlikely to convince any but the most gullible. Mandelson is a Liar of Record. He is the strongest candidate in Britain for the title of Public Liar Number One, and it’s a strong field. He has twice been kicked out of government – or reluctantly dropped by his pal Tony Blair – for offenses that, when he was first accused of them, he tried to wriggle out of by lying. His denials are almost a guarantee that the opposite is the truth.

Another way to look at the case is this: is it remotely plausible that the Scottish Justice Minister, Kenny MacAskill, whose responsibility it was to release the mass murderer or not, would take it upon himself, all alone, to let him go, in the teeth of public opinion at home and abroad, against the wishes of the government of which he is part, and the Westminster government?

Wakes up one morning, this remarkable Kenny guy, and with everything else he has to think about suddenly banished from his mind, is overwhelmed with a sense of pity for that Libyan mass murderer – whatsisname? – in prison because the poor chap has a terminal illness. Can’t bear to think of it. ‘I’ll let him go, to die at home, in the bosom of his family,’ this deeply compassionate politician decides. ‘I’ll brave the howls of anger and pain that will come from the families of his victims. I’ll defy my government and the government of the United Kingdom. I’ll ignore the understanding we had with the Americans that the bomber will stay in prison for life. I’ll risk derision and reproach, and do this great good deed even if it means my removal from office! That’s how heroic I am going to be.’

Has any politician in history ever been so selfless before, or is likely to be again?

You have to admire him!

Strange though, we might think, that a man so supremely compassionate couldn’t spare a little of that feeling for the families of the victims.

But there it is. He acted alone. Moved by nothing but a moral consideration. And luckily for him not a word of reproach, or disagreement, or even surprise, was flung his way by the governments who had nothing to do with his out-of-the-blue decision.

Or is it possible that we, the general public, are being played for fools?

Noah Pollak writes on the Commentary ‘contentions’ site:

The world’s nuclear weapons watchdog is hiding data on Iran’s drive to obtain nuclear arms … The officials and diplomats said that the International Atomic Energy Agency under Director General Mohamed ElBaradei was refraining from publishing evidence obtained by its inspectors over the past few months that indicate Iran was pursuing information about weaponization efforts and a military nuclear program.

ElBaradei … has said that the agency does not have any evidence that suggests Iran is developing a nuclear weapon.

But … new evidence was submitted to the IAEA in a classified annex written by its inspectors in the Islamic Republic. The report was said to have been signed by the head of the IAEA team in Iran. The classified report, according to the sources, was not incorporated into the agency’s published reports. The details, they said, were censored by senior officials of the IAEA in the organization’s Vienna headquarters.

Our view expressed in A Pointless War (see below) is endorsed by a writer who knows Afghanistan intimately.

Mona Charen writes about the man, his book, and his argument:

He was certainly brave, but was he crazy? That’s what I wondered when I picked up Rory Stewart’s “The Places in Between,” an account of the Scotsman’s 2002 solo walk across Afghanistan. That’s right, he walked. Many Afghans doubted he would survive the journey. Just weeks after the fall of the Taliban, in the dead of winter, in some of the most remote and difficult terrain in the inhabited world, he went from village to village on foot. Relying on the tradition of hospitality, Stewart found welcome, sustenance, and shelter (mostly, but not always) graciously offered by people who had very little to share.

Stewart, a British Foreign Service officer … and a Harvard professor, relied upon his knowledge of Farsi and Urdu, his understanding of Afghan history and culture, and his own hardy constitution to get him through. The portrayal of Afghanistan that resulted was illuminating and honest. He was unsparing about the deception and cruelty he witnessed, as well as the warmth and fellowship. I recall in particular the vignette about local children throwing stones at a dog for fun. For several years, Stewart lived in Kabul, where he established a charitable foundation seeking to promote local crafts.

So when Stewart raises a yellow flag about our escalating commitment to Afghanistan, we should take notice.

The rationale that President Obama has offered for our ramped-up engagement in Afghanistan, Stewart argues in a piece for the London Review of Books, runs as follows: We cannot permit the Taliban to return to power or they will revive the alliance with al-Qaida and will plot more catastrophic attacks on the United States. In order to defeat the Taliban, we must create a functioning state in the country, and in order to create a functioning state, we must defeat the Taliban. Obama seems keen to increase our role in Afghanistan to highlight the contrast with his predecessor. Bush, Obama ceaselessly repeats, fought “a war of choice” whereas Obama will fight only “a war of necessity.”

Obama argues that Afghanistan represents such a war. But does it? In order to achieve the goal of a “stable” Afghanistan, President Obama has deployed (for starters) 17,000 more U.S. troops at a preliminary cost of $5.5 billion. His stated goals for this poor, decentralized, and shell-shocked nation match in ambition and grandiosity the claims that George W. Bush made for a revived Iraq — but with arguably less foundation. “There are no mass political parties in Afghanistan and the Kabul government lacks the base, strength or legitimacy of the Baghdad government,” Stewart writes. There is almost no economic activity in the nation aside from international aid and the drug trade. Stewart notes that while Afghanistan is not a hopeless case, it is not at all clear that it is “the most dangerous place on Earth” as advocates of a massively increased U.S. and British role argue. In fact, neighboring Pakistan, sheltering al-Qaida (including, in all likelihood, bin Laden) and possessing nuclear weapons, represents a far graver threat to our national security. Stewart believes that bin Laden operates out of Pakistan precisely because Pakistan, a more robust state than Afghanistan, restricts U.S. operations. Nor is it clear that Afghanistan poses more of a threat than, say, Somalia or Yemen. Obama promises a “comprehensive approach” that will promote “a more capable and accountable Afghan government … advance security, opportunity and justice … (and) develop an economy that isn’t dominated by illicit drugs.”

This is more than we have the knowledge or ability to accomplish, Stewart argues. As for the necessity, he is unconvinced that the Taliban should loom so large as a threat to the West. He thinks it unlikely that the Taliban will regain control of the entire country (though they do control some provincial capitals). Unlike the situation in 1996, the Afghans now have experience of Taliban rule. “Millions of Afghans disliked their brutality, incompetence and primitive attitudes. The Hazara, Tajik and Uzbek populations are wealthier, more established and more powerful than they were in 1996 and would strongly resist any attempt by the Taliban to occupy their areas.” In any case, a more circumscribed foreign role should be sufficient to prevent the revival of terrorist training camps — as it has since 2001.

One might have thought, listening to the opponents of the Iraq War, that a certain modesty about nation building would be axiomatic among liberals. Instead, we are witnessing something else entirely — the approach is now brainlessly partisan. Your nation building is a war crime. My nation building is a national security necessity. …

Charles Krauthammer calls the release of al-Megrahi (see our two posts below) ‘decadence masquerading as compassion’.  Brilliantly right-on!

Abe Greenwald writes at Commentary’s ‘contentions’ website:

Qaddafi is due in New York next month to address the United Nations. In preparation for his first-ever trip to the U.S., the arms supplier for everyone from Idi Amin to Charles Taylor has requested that he be allowed to set up his Bedouin-style tent somewhere on U.S. soil and reside in it when not at the General Assembly lectern. Whether Qaddafi ends up on Central Park’s Great Lawn or at the New York Palace, the Libyan leader, who himself is believed to have played a crucial role in the Lockerbie bombing, will be hosted in the U.S. It kind of takes the sting off the moralistic denunciations which emanated from Washington yesterday.

The American State Department and the UN are hardly alone in pretending that Qaddafi has become a reliable Western ally. He was an honored guest at last month’s G8 meeting in Italy, where he met personally with England’s prime minister, Gordon Brown. Moreover, British Petroleum is launching its biggest exploration project in oil-rich Libya. Needless to say, the Russians are also interested in Libya’s oil and natural-gas reserves, but so far Qaddafi seems partial to Western countries whose technologies hold the most promise for full production.

Yesterday, Hillary Clinton condemned Megrahi’s release. But on what grounds can Secretary Clinton denounce the actions of Scotland’s authorities? She is on the record as a fan of Qaddafi’s “rehabilitation.” So too is President Obama. In all likelihood, the thriving, jet-setting Qaddafi played a more important role in the killing of 189 Americans in the 1988 midair bombing than did the dying Megrahi.

Not incidentally, it is Qaddafi, and not Megrahi, who presides over a government that is a human-rights abomination. A still active law passed in 1972 states that Libyans who “exercise their rights to freedom of expression and association may face the death penalty.” There are no independent human-rights NGOs in Libya, there is no asylum law, and foreign nationals are tortured and sometimes executed without recourse.

As the U.S.—the indispensable guardian of justice and human rights—continues to buddy up to individuals like Qaddafi (and Kim Jong-il and Manuel Zelaya and Gen.Than Shwe and Hosni Mubarak et al.), Americans should not be surprised if other governments ease up on similar and lesser monsters. And our statespeople will sound ever more hypocritical in their condemnations of the moral laxity and bad judgment demonstrated by our allies.

The son of Qaddafi [or Kadhafi] confirms our suspicion that a dirty deal was done and political pressure  brought to bear where it should have no influence (the decision of a British court of law) in connection with the release of al-Megrahi, the Libyan jailed for the Lockerbie bombing (see the post below).

From Breitbart:

The release of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi was linked to trade deals with Britain, Seif al-Islam, the son of Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi, said in a interview broadcast Friday.

For confirmation that the release was arranged by the British Foreign Office go to this article at Power Line:

I thought you might be interested in a conversation I had in London in mid-April (!) with very senior UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office officials about al-Megrahi. After leaving the Bush Administration in January I was on a work trip to London in mid-April and dropped by the FCO to check in with a couple of my former FCO colleagues. One high ranking British diplomat – a personal friend – complained to me that the release of al-Megrahi was forthcoming…

Not only is Andy McCarthy on the right track, it’s even worse than that. We spoke (complained?) at length about the issue and it was very from my conversation that the decision was left to Number 10, and was being driven by the FCO in part to curry favor with Qaddafi after a rocky “rebooting” period.

I’ve been quite perplexed at the characterization of this as a Scottish decision, as my friend spoke of it in terms of something that had already been cleared conditionally by the courts and had been signed off on by the Prime Minister. In fact, he pointed me toward this February 2009 AFP article, mentioning that it was a trial balloon from the British government to test the reaction in the US and UK.

And there is this from Investor’s Business Daily (22 August):

Curiously, last November, just after President Obama’s election, Britain’s Parliament passed a Prisoner Transfer Agreement with Libya. We say “curious” because it appears the only prisoner it could have related to was al-Megrahi. Was he sick then? If not, why was it passed?

We wonder, and we’re not alone, if this was a deal to curry favor with Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhafi, who sent his private jet to pick up al-Megrahi. After all, energy giant BP has contracts and business dealings in Libya and no doubt wants more.