Washington (AP) The White House says President Bush called Libya's Moammar Gadhafi to thank him for settling a long-standing dispute between Washington and Tripoli over terrorist attacks in the 1980s.
Bush's call was revealed Monday morning by White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe.
At the end of October, Libya paid $1.5 billion into a fund to compensate the families of American victims of Libyan-linked attacks. That cleared the last hurdle in full normalization of diplomatic relations.
Johndroe said that Bush and gadhafi said the claims settlement agreement, which includes payments for the 1988 pan am bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, “should help to bring a painful chapter in the history between our two countries closer to closure.”
