BP may face probe over bomber's release

[Robbien]

Source: CNN

(CNN) -- A group of U.S. lawmakers have called for an investigation into whether BP may have played a role in lobbying for the release of Abdelbaset al Megrahi to secure an oil contract with the Libyan government.

Megrahi, now 58, was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 which killed 270 people, including 189 Americans.

. . .

"Reports have surfaced indicating that a 2007 oil agreement may have influenced the U.K. and Scottish governments' positions concerning Mr. Megrahi's release in 2009," wrote Democratic Senator Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey in a letter to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on Monday.

. . .

BP, which plans to begin offshore drilling in Libya in the coming months, touted the 2007 oil agreement as "the single biggest exploration financial commitment an international energy company has ever made to Libya," according to the company's website.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/07/13/bp.release.connection/

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Megrahi was said to be released because he had only three months to live, prostate cancer. The doctor who made that prognoses is now saying the man could live up to ten years. The doctor said he was asked to give the first diagnoses by the Libyan government.

[Angry Dragon]

1. That doctor should lose his license and finish up the jail time

for Megrahi.........that seems fair

[sabrina 1]

3. There are some serious questions about whether or not

he was guilty. Some people think that this was justice, including some of the victim's families in Britain.

As for this story, even if it happened, it wouldn't change the fact that the man may have been innocent but it would show that BP has only one goal and that is profits. And I don't know why they are still in charge of the disaster they caused in the Gulf.

[CBGLuthier]

4. you have a very strange concept of fair

[dipsydoodle]

2. The subject does of course assume

that Megrani was infact guilty. After a three-year investigation the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission had already announced a "miscarriage of justice may have occurred". Shipping him had the purposeful effect of preventing a new trial at which there are doubts he would've been found guily again.

Presumably "the Lawmakers" will pay for the investigation out of their own pockets. :sarcasm:

Here's a source to the subject from almost a year ago :

Lockerbie bomber 'set free for oil'

The British government decided it was “in the overwhelming interests of the United Kingdom” to make Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the Lockerbie bomber, eligible for return to Libya, leaked ministerial letters reveal.

Gordon Brown’s government made the decision after discussions between Libya and BP over a multi-million-pound oil exploration deal had hit difficulties. These were resolved soon afterwards.

The letters were sent two years ago by Jack Straw, the justice secretary, to Kenny MacAskill, his counterpart in Scotland, who has been widely criticised for taking the formal decision to permit Megrahi’s release.

The correspondence makes it plain that the key decision to include Megrahi in a deal with Libya to allow prisoners to return home was, in fact, taken in London for British national interests.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6814939.ece please note article expressed as opinion : not news item.