BP faces safety charges in lawsuit

BOSTON, Feb. 16 (UPI) -- A class action suit filed against British energy company BP accuses the oil giant of ignoring safety issues years before the April spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

BP's offshore Deepwater Horizon rig caught fire and sank in April, killing 11 workers and leading to one of the worst environmental disasters in the history of the industry.

A U.S. federal panel in its report released in January found the failure of the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico "can be traced to a series of identifiable mistakes made by BP, Halliburton and Transocean that reveal such systematic failures in risk management that they place in doubt the safety culture of the entire industry."

A group of investors in a class action suit accuse BP of firing key safety officials allegedly after they raised issues regarding worker stress from long hours on the job, The Washington Post reports.

The suit also claims the BP officials who resigned in 2009 did so because of key "disagreements" and a "lack of commitment" to safety issues.

The investors who filed the suit said they have internal BP memos that said there were "missed signals" and "insufficient awareness" regarding safety-related issues.

BP said it wouldn't comment to the Post on pending legal issues.