EDINBURGH, Scotland, Dec. 28 (UPI) -- The Scottish government is determined to ensure the public of transparency involving the Lockerbie bombing case, the justice secretary said.
Lockerbie bomber and former Libyan intelligence officer Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was released from prison by Scottish officials in August 2009 on compassion grounds because of a terminal prostate cancer diagnosis.
A spokesman for Edinburgh was quoted by the BBC in September as saying it decided that Megrahi acted as a member of the former regime's intelligence service, adding he likely didn't act alone.
Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said he welcomed assurances from the British government that it would work with a review commission on removing obstacles to publishing files concerns an abandoned appeal by Megrahi.
"We in the Scottish government have always made it clear that we want to be as open as possible when it comes to publishing information relating to the Lockerbie atrocity," he said in a statement.
Megrahi said in a recent interview reported in The Guardian newspaper and other British outlets that he's "an innocent man."
He gave the interview shortly after Scotland's top lawyer, Frank Mulholland, met with FBI Director Robert Mueller to discuss the bombing. Mulholland told Mueller that he believed the 1988 bombing was state-sponsored terrorism.
