Libya accuses France of blackmail to lifting the UN sanctions

The secretary of the Libyan people's general committee for foreign contacts and international cooperation Abdul Rahman Shalqam has accused France of practicing what he described "the policy of unaccepted pressure and blackmail" concerning lifting the UN sanctions imposed on Libya.

Shalqam added following his meeting in Njamina with Chad's President Idris Debi that the Libyan government conveyed its position to the French foreign minister Dominique de Villepin.

This was expressed after American officials said that France had threatened unofficially to use the veto against a draft resolution at the UN Security Council to lift the sanctions imposed by the UN on Libya because of the Lockerbie incident unless Tripoli pays similar compensations to families of the victims of French blown plane in 1989.

In a statement, the French foreign ministry said that Paris wants more compensations for families of 170 members who were killed in the explosion incident of the French Ota company plane during its flights no. 772 over Niger in 1989, before approving to lift the sanctions from Libya.

The French position threatens to postpone or undermine an agreement Libya intends, according to which it would pay compensations estimated at USD 2.7 billion to the families of 270 members killed in the explosion of flight no. 103 of a Pan American plane over Lockerbie town in Scotland in 1988.