Libya pays 170 million for families of the French plane

Libya approved to pay financial compensations estimated at 170 million dollars for the families of the victims of the French Yuta plane, as Libyans were accused of blowing it up.

A French official said that Libya approved to pay the said sum, in addition to other 34 million already paid earlier, and considered as not enough. The French official added that the two countries will issue shortly a joint statement on supporting bilateral relations which witnessed great tension, because of the disputes over the issue of the plane incident.

One participants in the negotiations said that the signing ceremony will take place in an official celebration in Paris today ( Friday), noting that the negotiations were made in a certain place outside the capital Paris.

A spokeswoman for the French Senate speaker, who met with the Libyan foreign minister, Muhammad Abdul Rahman Shalqam, during his visit to France that the agreement is a sort of road map to reform relations between France and Libya.

It was decided that Shalqam will be meeting with his French counterpart Dominique de Villepin today, in order to agree on the final details of the agreement, and to issue a joint statement concerning relations in a press conference today evening.

The compensations, however, are expected to be paid to the families of the victims who are from 17 nationalities including Africans, Americans, British and Italians on board of the plane which was downed over Niger, in west of Africa.

France persisted that settling the compensations will be the base for any reconciliation between Libya and the West.

After France in 2003 threatened to veto at the UN Security Council to lift the UN sanctions from Libya, after it had realized the small value of the offered settlement of the plane issue, it changed its mind as Tripoli announced in will increase the value of compensation for the incident, in which 6 Libyans were convicted in absentia in a French court.