Lockerbie Bomber Drops Appeal, Scotland Mulls Move

Police and investigators look at what remains of the flight deck of Pan Am 103 on a field in...

Police and investigators look at what remains of the flight deck of Pan Am 103 on a field in Lockerbie, Scotland, in this Dec. 22, 1988 file photo. According to British media reports, Thursday Aug. 13, 2009, Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi is to be freed from prison on compassionate grounds, but Scotland's government denied any such decision had been made. Officials dismissed the reports as speculation, and said Scotland's justice minister had yet to review all case information before deciding whether al-Megrahi should be released from a Scottish prison. The former Libyan secret service agent is terminally ill with cancer.(AP Photo/File)

(AP)

The only man found guilty in the 1988 airplane bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, is dropping his appeal, his lawyers said Friday — removing an obstacle to his possible transfer to Libya but disappointing activists who believe he is innocent.

Abdel Baset Ali al-Megrahi's lawyer, Tony Kelly, said his client, who is terminally ill with prostate cancer, filed papers to drop his appeal because his health had deteriorated.

"His condition has taken a significant turn for the worse in recent weeks," the lawyer said.

British broadcasters reported this week, without citing sources, that al-Megrahi had been given just months to live and would be released early from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds.

The former Libyan secret service agent was convicted for the December 1988 bombing of Pan Am 103, which killed 270 people — most of them Americans. It was the deadliest terrorist attack ever committed in Britain.

The United States has firmly objected to reports that al-Megrahi might be released.

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters Friday that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton had called Scottish Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill in the past day and "expressed strongly" the U.S. view that "al-Megrahi should serve out the entirety of his sentence in Scotland for his part in the bombing of the Pan Am 103 flight."

Crowley said the U.S. attorney general, Eric Holder, also had called MacAskill in the past few days.

"Our interest is justice, and our interest is the commitment that we made to the families" of the victims, Crowley said.

"He was brought to trial. He had a fair trial. He was convicted. He's serving his time. And we think he should stay in jail," he added.

The Scottish government said it has yet to decide on his request for early release. They are also considering allowing al-Megrahi to serve the rest of his sentence in Libya.