Word: probed
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...been ratcheting up pressure on airlines since March, when it launched "phase one" of a probe that required its inspectors to make sure each carrier was complying with 10 randomly chosen "airworthiness directives," the agency's written safety bulletins. (About 200 are issued annually.) The FAA followed that with what it calls "phase two," where its inspectors are reviewing 10% of all airworthiness directives per fleet to determine compliance. Initial results show the airlines have been complying with about 99% of the directives. But that remaining 1% was enough to cause hundreds of flight cancellations...
...dressing down from the judiciary can hardly come much rougher. The High Court in London, in a damning rebuke of ex-Prime Minister Tony Blair's administration, ruled Thursday that the government's own Serious Fraud Office (SFO) broke the law in 2006 when it scrapped a corruption probe into arms deals between BAE Systems, Britain's biggest defense firm, and Saudi Arabia...
...judgment, handed down by Lord Justice Moses and Justice Sullivan, censured Robert Wardle, director of the SFO, for allowing threats made by Saudi officials to scupper the probe into allegations of bribery. The Blair government called a halt to that investigation in December 2006, a decision it insisted was made purely in the interest of national security. The court was scathingly unconvinced. "No one, whether within this country or outside, is entitled to interfere with the course of our justice," the judges ruled. "It is the failure of Government and [Wardle] to bear that essential principle in mind that justifies...
...probe, begun in July 2004, focused on the alleged payment of bribes by BAE in connection with its $60 billion "Al-Yamamah" arms deal agreed with Saudi Arabia in the mid-'80s. According to the High Court judgment, BAE sought in late 2005 to persuade Lord Goldsmith, then Britain's Attorney General, to call a halt to the inquiry, claiming it would sour relations between the U.K. and Saudi Arabia, and endanger future lucrative arms deals...
...British justice," says Susan Hawley of NGO The Corner House, one of two pressure groups to have brought the case before the High Court. More could follow. In the next few weeks, the court is expected to force the SFO to reevaluate its decision to scrap the probe, amid mounting pressure for it to revive the investigation. Right now, the SFO is "carefully considering the implications of the judgment and the way forward," a spokesman said. Lawyers acting for the pressure groups expect the government to appeal the ruling. Meanwhile, U.S. Department of Justice and Swiss authorities are continuing their...