Lockerbie bomber's first Wales varsity snap testimony to his UK student status

London, Aug 20 (ANI): At a time when the controversy of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi's release has attracted international debate, a Wales university ID card photograph of him as a 19-year-old boy, reveals for the first time that he spent nine months in the country as a student after he was set free from a Scottish prison

Exactly a year after his controversial release on compassionate grounds, the photograph has been brought to the limelight, which testifies that Megrahi arrived in the UK in 1971 to study engineering at Cardiff College of Technology.

"The snap shows a handsome, carefree teenager with seemingly a promising future ahead of him. It is a contrast of how haggard he now looks as a convicted mass murderer with terminal prostate cancer," The Sun quoted a source close to the case, as saying.

It has also been revealed that Megrahi studied for a short time in the US.

Earlier, British Prime Minister David Cameron and the US President Barack Obama had condemned his release.

Meanwhile, London has warned Libya that any celebrations on Friday to mark the one-year anniversary of the Lockerbie bomber's release would be "tasteless, offensive and deeply insensitive". (ANI)