Libya crowd cheers Lockerbie bomber

12 April 2012

The freed Lockerbie bomber has arrived in Libya to a "hero's welcome" after being released from prison in Scotland on compassionate grounds.

Pictures from Tripoli showed hundreds of people - some waving Scottish and Libyan flags - greeting Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi as he got off the plane.

A crowd also gathered in the city's Green Square to apparently celebrate his release.

Megrahi, who has terminal cancer, was released on compassionate grounds by Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill.

He was serving a life sentence for murdering 270 people when a Pan Am plane was brought down over the Scottish town in 1988.

Pamela Dix, whose brother Peter was among the victims, condemned the celebrations.

"I think a hero's welcome is entirely inappropriate in the circumstances," she said.

"I know the man maintains his innocence but I think discretion would have been the right thing in these circumstances. But that was probably too much to expect.

"He has been released on compassionate grounds but he remains a convicted man. His return to Tripoli should not have been handled in this way.

"It has been a rollercoaster of a day - there has been an awful lot of thinking and reflecting on everything that has happened since Lockerbie. In general, things have got worse for us, not better."

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