US committee seeks Libya payment on Pan Am deaths

WASHINGTON - A US House of Representatives committee has approved legislation prohibiting diplomatic ties with Libya unless it continues paying restitution to families of those killed in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland.

US lawmakers are hoping to keep the pressure on Libya to make a final US$536 ($877.10) million payment, out of a $2.7 billion settlement, to families of the victims of the flight.

The House Appropriations Committee included the measure in a fiscal 2007 State Department spending bill that the full House is expected to pass this summer.

The amendment, by Rep. John Sweeney, a New York Republican, came after the Senate on June 8 unanimously approved a non-binding resolution calling on President George W. Bush to hold off restoring diplomatic ties with Libya until questions about the Pan Am Flight 103 restitution were resolved.

A bomb aboard that airplane exploded, killing 270 people, including 189 Americans. The bomb was linked to Libyan agents.

On May 15, the Bush administration announced a 45-day process aimed at restoring full diplomatic ties with Tripoli after Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi scrapped his country's weapons of mass destruction programme.

Sweeney's amendment would prohibit the US from issuing diplomatic credentials to the Libyan government unless it co-operates in the monetary settlement.

- REUTERS