Word: britain
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...fireworks exploded over Tripoli - almost all Western leaders stayed away - the controversy over al-Megrahi's release continued in the U.S. and Britain, where some victims' families and politicians say they suspect that Britain secretly traded al-Megrahi's freedom for big oil deals in energy-rich Libya. (See pictures of Lockerbie 20 years...
...Scottish document in particular could cause grief for Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who insists that Britain had nothing to do with al-Megrahi's release. By contrast, the document, the minutes of a March 2009 meeting between Libyan and Scottish officials, says a Libyan minister recounted being told by British Foreign Minister Bill Rammell "that neither the prime minister [Brown] nor the foreign secretary [David Miliband] would want Mr. Megrahi to pass away in prison, but the decision on transfer lies in the hands of the Scottish ministers." If the critically ill al-Megrahi died in jail, the Libyan minister...
...correspondence, Justice Minister Straw didn't specifically mention Libya's oil wealth. But the importance of maintaining Britain's good ties with Gaddafi is clear in the letters, as when Straw explained why he chose not to exclude al-Megrahi from a prisoner-transfer agreement between Britain and Libya that was signed in November 2008. "I do not believe it is necessary, or sensible, to risk damaging our wide ranging and beneficial relationship with Libya," he wrote, before signing off, "Yours, Jack...
...friend, used baroque language to spin fantastical tales spanning continents and centuries, Kureishi stayed street. His father figures were faded and refined - dusty relics from a more gracious time who looked to literature or socialism to block out the cold realities of being foreign-born in 1970s Britain. Their sons weren't Pakistanis but "Pakis," who snorted coke, fornicated and embraced the Thatcherite dream of making money fast. "When I was in school, the long-standing stereotype of the South Asian male was of the studious nerd, who was going straight to an enviable university to make his parents proud...
...America debates healthcare reform, Britons - and Europeans more widely - have rediscovered how much they love their state-backed health services. Britain's National Health Service (NHS) is a rare example of truly socialized medicine, with universally available treatment administered by the government and funded by the taxpayer. As such, it has become the target of criticism from opponents of President Barack Obama's efforts to introduce greater state involvement in health care, with accusations of "Orwellian" administrators setting a price on life, and doctors abandoning elderly patients...