Did Obama administration push for release of Lockerbie bomber?

Here are the types of statements that the Obama has made about the release:

“I think all of us here in the United States were surprised, disappointed and angry about the release of the Lockerbie bomber,” Obama said in a short news conference dominated by the topic. ” . . .

Now we hear this:

THE US government secretly advised Scottish ministers it would be "far preferable" to free the Lockerbie bomber than jail him in Libya.

Correspondence obtained by The Sunday Times reveals the Obama administration considered compassionate release more palatable than locking up Abdel Baset al-Megrahi in a Libyan prison.

The intervention, which has angered US relatives of those who died in the attack, was made by Richard LeBaron, deputy head of the US embassy in London, a week before Megrahi was freed in August last year on grounds that he had terminal cancer.

The document, acquired by a well-placed US source, threatens to undermine US President Barack Obama's claim last week that all Americans were "surprised, disappointed and angry" to learn of Megrahi's release. . . .