Lockerbie bomber hospitalised in Tripoli: Report

September 27th, 2009 NEW YORK - Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi has denied rumours that Libya and Scotland Government had made a deal to release the Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi. In an interview to a news channel, Gaddafi claimed that Megrahi was freed from a prison in Scotland due to his illness.

September 13th, 2009 LONDON - The Lockerbie bomber's brother has said that Abdel Basset al-Megrahi's health condition has deteriorated rapidly in the last 24 hours, and he is now unable to speak. "He is at a special ward at Tripoli Medical Centre.

September 11th, 2009 LONDON - US President Barack Obama reportedly blasted British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on the phone for his decision to set the Lockerbie bomber free, indicating that the US-Britain relations have hit a new low. During his 40-minute telephone call, Obama made it clear that he was "disappointed" that cancer-stricken Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi was freed, The Sun reports.

September 10th, 2009 TRIPOLI - Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi has said he will demand a permanent place in the UN's Security Council for Africa and compensation worth $777 trillion for years of colonialism in New York later this month. "I will tell the world that Africa deserves a $777-trillion compensation for the years of colonialism, massacres and slavery it was subjected to," Gaddafi told African leaders gathered in Tripoli Wednesday night.

September 2nd, 2009 LONDON - Britain's Conservative Party has accused Prime Minister Gordon Brown of double dealing with regard to the release of Lockerbie bomber Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi. An official document has emerged claiming that Libya was told that Brown wanted the Lockerbie bomber to die a free man.

September 1st, 2009 TRIPOLI - Libya has decided to celebrate the Lockerbie bomber's release openly at today's festivities marking Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's 40 years in power, it has emerged. A video clip showing Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi stepping off the plane which brought him home from his Scottish prison two weeks ago will be projected onto a giant screen in Tripoli's Green Square during the two-hour spectacular, the Times reports.

September 1st, 2009 TRIPOLI - Libya began Tuesday a week of celebrations marking the 40th anniversary of the coup d'etat that brought Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi to power in 1969. The festivities are being attended by Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez along with African leaders who include Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe and Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir.

August 30th, 2009 WASHINGTON - The United States had offered 'millions' to keep the convicted Lockerbie bomber, Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, under house arrest in UK, but Scotland went ahead with the controversial decision to release the convicted Lockerbie bomber. US officials had "very reluctantly" backed a proposal to move Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi from Greenock Prison into some kind of high-security accommodation elsewhere in Scotland, The Independent quoted senior government sources, as saying.

August 25th, 2009 TRIPOLI - The Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al Megrahi, who was released on compassionate grounds by the Scottish Government, could cash in on his notoriety by publishing his 'tell all' autobiography. According to reports, Megrahi has begun writing the memoir, despite his insistence that he is suffering from terminal prostate cancer and has only three months to live.

August 25th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A whopping 82 percent of Americans oppose Scotland's justice minister's decision to release the convicted Lockerbie bomber, a new poll has found. Last week, Baset not only set Abdel Baset al-Megrahi free but also allowed him to return to Libya on so-called compassionate grounds.

August 22nd, 2009 TRIPOLI - Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi met Lockerbie attacker Abdel Basset al-Megrahi a day after he was released from a Scottish jail, a news report said. Gaddafi received the terminally ill 57-year-old and his family Friday, the Libyan news agency Jana said.

August 22nd, 2009 TRIPOLI - Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi, the man accused of perpetrating the bombing of a Pan Am Flight 103 that claimed 270 lives in 1988 in Lockerbie, southern Scotland, has once again proclaimed his innocence. In an interview to The Times at his house, in the Dimachk area of Tripoli, al-Megrahi who was released by the Scottish authorities earlier this week on grounds of ill health, said: " I always believed I would come back if justice prevailed." He did not come across as bitter or angry but continued to insist on his innocence, as he has done from the day of his conviction.

August 21st, 2009 TRIPOLI - Libyans from all walks of life gave Lockerbie bomber Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi a rapturous welcome on his return to his native Libya late on Thursday night, even as the survivors and relatives of those killed condemned his release and clamoured for justice. US President Barack Obama also regretted the British Government's decision to release al-Megrahi, while a senior State Department official said that Washington would not block Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's visit to the United Nations for next month's General Assembly meeting.

August 21st, 2009 WASHINGTON - The reception in Libya following the release by Scottish authorities of the man convicted for the Lockerbie bombing was "outrageous and disgusting", the White House said Friday. Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, 57, was greeted by a huge cheering crowd at Ma'atiqa International airport in Tripoli after he was freed, despite warnings from the US against a "hero's welcome" for the only person convicted in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie in Scotland.

August 13th, 2009 WASHINGTON - The US voiced opposition to releasing a Libyan serving a life sentence in Scotland for the 1988 Lockerbie bombing that killed 270 people. "We have made our views clear to the UK government, to other authorities, that we believe that he should spend the rest of his time in jail," State Department spokesman PJ Crowley said.