Brown: Lockerbie bomber not traded for oil

LONDON, Aug. 31 (UPI) -- Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi was not released as part of an oil exploration deal with Libya, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown says.

Brown's office told CNN Monday "there was no deal over the release" of al-Megrahi, who was returned to Libya from Scottish jail this month on the grounds that he is dying of cancer.

The prime minister denied suggestions in a Sunday Times of London story that al-Megrahi's inclusion to be eligible for release in a prisoner exchange program with Tripoli was made in order to smooth the way for the British oil giant BP to win exploration rights in Libya.

"The central assertion in this story is completely untrue and deeply misleading," CNN reported Brown's office as saying.

Justice Minister Jack Straw, while confirming that al-Megrahi was given eligibility to be part of a possible exchange program, said that move was irrelevant to his release since the bomber was freed by Scotland on compassionate grounds, not as part of a deal with Libya, CNN said.

Scottish offiicials freed Megrahi while he was serving a life sentence for the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, killing 270 people.