This is the headline over an article today on The Times website. It reads in part:
'President George Bush has signed legislation that paves the way for the US to settle all remaining lawsuits against Libya by American terrorism victims, and paves the way for complete rapprochement between the former rogue state and the US. ...
'The Libyan Claims Resolution Act creates a fund to compensate the victims, and grants Libya immunity from terror-related lawsuits. Under the arrangement, the country would not accept responsibility for the acts but would provide the money to compensate the victims. ...
'The bill will allow the Lockerbie and La Belle victims, who already have settlements with Libya, to recover the full amount they're owed. Libya has paid the 268 families involved in the Pan Am settlement $US8m (£4,065,000) each but it owes them $US2m (£1,016,200) more.'
The separate account on the Jurist website contains useful links to background material and reactions.
Henk Ruyssenaars' commentary can be read on the Storming Heaven's Gates blog.
According to the akhbarlibya-english.com website, Senator Biden (D-Delaware) and Senator Levin (D-Michigan), two co-sponsors of the legislation, spoke in the 31 July 2008 U.S. Senate debate on the
ReplyDeleteLibyan Claims Resolution Act [Congressional Record page: S7979] as follows:
"Biden: For several months now, the Bush administration has been negotiating with the Government of Libya on a comprehensive settlement to compensate American victims of Libyan terror. The State Department has reported to us in recent days that an agreement has been reached but has not yet been signed. I commend the fine effort of Assistant Secretary of State David Welch and Deputy Legal Adviser Jonathan Schwartz, who led the U.S. delegation in these very difficult negotiations. Signature on the agreement awaits action by Congress, and that is what we are doing today.
The agreement will provide full compensation to pay settlements already reached in the Pan Am 103 and LaBelle cases and enough funds to ensure that every American claimant in these cases involving Libyan terrorism will receive financial compensation comparable to the Pan Am 103 and LaBelle settlements. No U.S. taxpayer money will be used to pay these claims. The regime in Libya is notoriously unpredictable, so there is a chance that the deal could fall apart. But there is reason to believe that the Libyan leader, Colonel Qadhafi, has decided it is in his interest to settle all of these cases, rather than let them languish in court for years or decades, at the expense of progress in the Libyan-American relationship. Should the government of Libya change its position and fail to provide the complete funding, the victims will retain their full rights to proceed with their legal challenges.
But before Libya is willing to sign the agreement, it wants legal assurances that upon providing the full funding it will be immune from further legal repercussions stemming from these cases. This legislation, if signed into law by the President, provides such assurances, allowing the deal to go forward. It authorizes the Secretary of State to work with the Libyans to set up the funding mechanism. It assures the Libyans that if and only if full compensation has been paid to all American victims of Libyan terrorism, they will be immune from further claims of this nature. . . .
Levin: Under the proposed international agreement the United States would receive sufficient funding to pay the two large outstanding settlements with Libya--the Pan Am 103 families' settlement and the La Belle Discotheque settlement--as Congress has requested in previous legislation. In addition, Libya would provide sufficient funds to ensure fair compensation of the other pending claims for acts of terrorism.
In return for this comprehensive claims settlement, the United States will need to assure Libya that it will not face further terrorism-related litigation in U.S. courts. This legislation, the Libya Claims Resolution Act, will restore Libya's sovereign immunity--once the United States has received the agreed funding.
With the enactment of this legislation, the international agreement can be concluded quickly and the money channeled to American claimants. According to the State Department, the Pan Am and La Belle claimants should receive their settlements shortly after the agreement is signed, ending years of waiting for just compensation from Libya."
The legislation omits any direct reference to compensation for the UTA Flight 772 bombing, but there is an implication that the families of its seven American victims could receive $10 million each.
There is no mention of U.S. compensation for the 40 Libyans killed (including Gaddafi's adopted daughter) when U.S. war planes bombed Tripoli and Benghazi in June 1986. Gaddafi's son, Saif al Islam, said on 24 July 2008:
"We offered the United States a comprehensive deal putting all the cases in one package but we want them to compensate the Libyan victims of the U.S. strike. This is our condition and they must satisfy it."
Nor is there any mention of Mr Megrahi's long-delayed appeal which, in overturning his Lockerbie bombing conviction, will exonerate Libya from responsibility for the Lockerbie bombing. The Libyan Claims Resolution Act might then need to be amended to allow for the compensation of more than $2 billion already paid to be refunded to Libya.