THE WALL STREET JOURNAL: Lawmakers and family members who lost loved ones are asking questions about what role oil giant BP played in the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
Showing posts with label Lockerbie 'oil deal'. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lockerbie 'oil deal'. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Sunday, July 18, 2010
THE INDEPENDENT ON SUNDAY: The US Senate is determined to uncover the truth behind the early release of the Lockerbie bomber
Alex Salmond has heaped pressure on Tony Blair over his alleged role in the controversial release of the Lockerbie bomber by claiming that the former prime minister should be forced to testify before a US Senate committee investigating the affair.
Amid growing concerns over the potential impact of the forthcoming foreign relations committee hearings, the Scottish First Minister advised senators to question Mr Blair over the infamous "deal in the desert" in 2007, when Mr Blair and the Libyan leader Colonel Gaddafi agreed plans to open the country up to foreign trade.
The call came as the Daily Mail claimed Mr Blair was flown to Libya for secret talks with Col Gaddafi last month, days after denying he was an adviser to the dictator.
The committee inquiry, led by Senator John Kerry, will investigate BP's alleged involvement in the release last August, on compassionate grounds, of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, who was convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103. But it threatens to turn into an embarrassing episode for a series of senior British figures. Both David Cameron and Foreign Secretary, William Hague, have said the release was "a mistake". But officials in Washington have confirmed that they want to ask past and present UK ministers to give evidence about their handling of the case – casting a shadow over former justice secretary Jack Straw and the Scottish Justice Minister, Kenny MacAskill, the man who authorised the release.
But, in an attempt to deflect criticism from his own administration, Mr Salmond suggested that the senators look elsewhere. "It is important to understand that what the American senators want to inquire about is whether there was a deal in the desert with Col Gaddafi," Mr Salmond said. "The best [way] to answer that would be to call Mr Blair and ask him directly." Continue reading and comment >>> Brian Brady and David Usborne | Sunday, July 18, 2010
Related article here
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
TIMES ONLINE: Tony Blair lobbied Colonel Muammar Gaddafi on behalf of Shell in a letter written for him in draft form by the oil company, documents obtained by The Times reveal.
The correspondence, written while Mr Blair was Prime Minister, bears a striking resemblance to a briefing note by Royal Dutch Shell weeks earlier promoting a $500 million (£325 million) deal it was trying to clinch in Libya.
While it is common for government ministers to champion British interests abroad, Shell’s draft reveals an unusual assurance in its ability to dictate Mr Blair’s conversation with the Libyan leader. It also raises questions about the motives behind Britain’s improved relations with Libya and the subsequent release of Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi, the Lockerbie bomber. Lockerbie victims have claimed that the Government paved the way for al-Megrahi’s release as part of a deal with Libya to give British companies access to Libya’s lucrative oil and gas industry.
In the draft, Shell tells Mr Blair to discuss positive progress on weapons of mass destruction as well as the investigation into the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher outside the Libyan Embassy in London in 1984. >>> David Robertson, Business Correspondent | Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Thursday, September 03, 2009
TIMES ONLINE: For some time America has regarded this country as Little Britain. The Lockerbie bomber case is seen as the final straw
After Gordon Brown met Colonel Muammar Gaddafi at the G8 summit in Italy earlier this year he joked that he had discovered Michael Jackson alive and well. There is indeed an uncanny resemblance between the Libyan leader and the King of Pop. But it was not, of course, the singer who asked the Prime Minister to release the Lockerbie bomber. Michael Jackson is dead — and so now is the “special relationship” between Britain and the United States.
The row over the decision to allow Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi to return to Libya is the final nail in the coffin for the transatlantic bond first identified by Winston Churchill after the Second World War. Even Barack Obama abandoned his normal diplomatic tone to criticise the “highly objectionable” arrival of the bomber in Tripoli. Robert Mueller, the head of the FBI, said that the release of the man convicted of murdering 270 people on Pan Am Flight 103 made a “mockery of justice” and would give “comfort to terrorists around the world”. There was a widespread assumption in Washington all along that the decision was linked to a trade deal.
For the Americans, this is not just about justice it is also about trust — the White House sees the release of al-Megrahi as a blatant breach of an agreement given by the British Government that he would serve out his sentence in Scotland. It is impossible to sustain a relationship, let alone a special one, if one partner can no longer believe what the other one says. In Whitehall there are already nervous mutterings about whether intelligence-sharing and military co-operation will be able to continue in the same way.
This may be a tipping point but in fact the United States has been tilting away from Britain for some time. Ironically, at the very moment when people in this country are rediscovering after years of hostility their love of America — as a result of the election of the first black president — the Americans are tiring of their old European flame.
On holiday on Long Island this summer, I was struck by the anti-British mood. There are T-shirts for sale in New York with the slogan “Britain’s not that great” printed next to pictures of a helmeted policeman and Big Ben. “Your country is just a dipshit little nation,” an influential celebrity agent told me over dinner in the Monkey Bar (the fashionable Manhattan restaurant that is part owned by the British restaurateur Jeremy King). “It’s got no power or influence any more. I bet only 5 per cent of the people in this room have even heard of Gordon Brown.”
In different areas, antipathy towards Britain is taking hold just as anti-Americanism in this country fades. The debate about health reform in the US has been dominated by distorted accounts of appalling death rates and eugenic policies under the “evil” NHS. Meanwhile, the British Armed Forces are facing increasing criticism for what the Americans see as a failure to pull their weight in Iraq and Afghanistan. The City of London has been decimated by the credit crunch and could end up paying a heavier price than Wall Street as the new financial world order takes shape. Even London Fashion Week is a poor relation to similar events in New York, Paris and Milan.
There is a growing perception in the US that the UK is losing its way — with MPs who have been caught fiddling their expenses, a recession deeper than anywhere else and a leader who has become a lame duck. Newsweek, the magazine that hailed Cool Britannia in the 1990s, recently redefined us as “Little Britain”, a nation struggling to keep a foothold in a rapidly changing world. It used to be said that we punched above our weight — but now we have become the global punch bag as China and India rise. The new dawn is over, replaced by a gloomy dusk. >>> Rachel Sylvester | Tuesday, September 01, 2009
TIMES ONLINE: A veteran United States senator has asked Congress to investigate whether negotiations for a lucrative Libyan oil contract played a role in the release of the Lockerbie bomber.
The call from Frank Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat, will add to the pressure on Gordon Brown, who has been accused of damaging - or even killing off - the transatlantic "special relationship" by backing the release of Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi.
The Prime Minister insisted yesterday that there had been nothing underhand in the decision by the Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill to free al-Megrahi. The 57-year-old is dying from prostate cancer.
“There was no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double-dealing, no deal on oil, no attempt to instruct Scottish ministers, no private assurances by me to Colonel Gaddafi,” Mr Brown told an audience in Birmingham.
The former Libyan intelligence office served just eight years of a life sentence for his role in the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, killing 270 people including 11 on the ground. Two-thirds of the victims were American and their relatives reacted with fury to the news that he was to be freed.
Mr Lautenberg called for a Senate investigation into the decision in a letter to Senator John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Richard Lugar, the ranking Republican member. He said that the congressional panel “must expose the truth" and “uncover whether justice took a back seat to commercial interests". >>> Philippe Naughton | Thursday, September 03, 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)