Libya’s Prime Minister Shokri Ghanem has said that Libya only agreed to pay compensation for the 1988 Lockerbie bombing to “buy peace”, according to a BBC interview to be broadcast. Ghanem also told BBC radio’s flagship “Today” programme there was no evidence that a Libyan was responsible for the shooting of a British policewoman 20 years ago, an event which led to London breaking off diplomatic relations with Tripoli. Libya formally accepted responsibility in August 2003 for the bombing of New York-bound Flight Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, southwest Scotland, and agreed to pay 2.7 billion dollars (2.2 billion euros) in compensation to families of the 270 victims. The following month the UN Security Council voted to lift sanctions against Libya. “We thought it was easier for us to buy peace and this is why we agreed to compensation,” Ghanem said. “Therefore we said, ‘Let us buy peace, let us put the whole case behind us and let us look forward’,” he added. Full Story
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