Libya makes last Pan Am 103 payment

WASHINGTON, Oct. 31 (UPI) -- President Bush signed an executive order Friday certifying that Libya has settled U.S. claims over the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103.

The president's order came after the United States received a final payment of $1.5 billion from the Libyan government. Under the U.S.-Libya Claims Settlement Agreement, the money is to be used to compensate the families of those killed by the explosion.

The plane, en route from London to New York, crashed in Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 people in the plane and on the ground. Many of the U.S. victims were college students returning home for Christmas from study abroad programs.

The executive order declares that all claims in the U.S. courts have been settled. It does not block foreign nationals from suing for damages elsewhere.

Libya agreed to pay compensation as part of a deal that would end economic sanctions and take it off the U.S. list of countries that sponsor terrorism. Some of the money is to be used for compensation for a bombing at a Berlin disco that killed two U.S. citizens and wounded 50 other people.

Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed Al Megrahi, a former Libyan intelligence agent, was convicted of the bombing and sentenced to life imprisonment in Scotland. A Scottish panel recently allowed him a second appeal, ruling that he may have been framed.

Megrahi was recently diagnosed with terminal cancer.