**The Libyan man jailed in Scotland for blowing up a US airliner over Lockerbie in 1988, has arrived home in Libya after being set free.**The Scottish government released Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, who is 57 and has terminal cancer, on compassionate grounds.
US President Barack Obama said the move was “a mistake”, and some relatives of US victims reacted angrily.
Most of the 270 people who died in the bombing were Americans.
In a radio interview, Mr Obama said: “We have been in contact with the Scottish government, indicating that we objected to this. We thought it was a mistake.”
He added that his administration had told the Libyan government that Megrahi should not receive a hero’s welcome and should be placed under house arrest.
A police convoy left Scotland’s Greenock Prison, where Megrahi was serving his sentence, more than an hour after the announcement of his release was made.
He was taken to Glasgow Airport to board the Afriqiyah Airways plane bound for Tripoli, where he landed at 1830 GMT.
The Scottish government said it had consulted widely before Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill made his decision on applications for Megrahi’s compassionate release or his transfer to a Libyan jail.
He told a news conference on Thursday that he had rejected the application for a prisoner transfer.
However, after taking medical advice it was expected that three months was a “reasonable estimate” of the time Megrahi had left to live.