Originally posted by the Voice of America.
Voice of America content is produced by the Voice of America,
a United States federal government-sponsored entity, and is in
the public domain.


BP Vows to Pay Costs of Oil Spill

   03 May 2010
   President  Barack  Obama  flying  along  the  coastline  from  Venice,
   Louisiana to New

Photo: AP

   President  Barack Obama talks with US Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Thad
   Allen,  who  is  serving  as  the  National Incident Commander, second
   right,  and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, aboard Marine One as they fly
   along the coastline from Venice, Louisiana to New Orleans, 02 May 2010

   Energy  giant  British  Petroleum  has vowed to pay "all necessary and
   appropriate  clean-up  costs"  of  a  huge oil spill spreading from an
   undersea well off the coast of the southeastern state of Louisiana.

   The  company  said  in a statement Monday that it is also ready to pay
   all legitimate claims for losses and damages caused by the spill.

   In  a visit to Louisiana Sunday, President Barack Obama laid the blame
   for the leak squarely on BP, which operates and maintains the undersea
   well.

   The  chief  executive officer of BP, Tony Hayward, told NBC television
   Monday  that  the  leak was not BP's fault, although BP is responsible
   for  the  oil and cleaning it up. He said the drilling rig that caused
   the  spill  was  made  by the Swiss-based firm Transocean and that the
   device "failed to run by their people and their processes."

   President  Obama has promised the U.S. government will do "whatever it
   takes,  for  as  long  as  it  takes"  to clean up the spill, which is
   threatening major environmental damage to the region.

   U.S.  officials  have  announced  a  halt  of  at least 10 days to all
   fishing  in  parts  of the Gulf of Mexico in the affected waters, from
   the mouth of the Mississippi River in Louisiana to waters of Florida's
   Pensacola Bay.

   An  April  20  oil rig explosion killed 11 workers and triggered leaks
   from the sea floor well-head, estimated at 800,000 liters of crude oil
   per  day.  A  mechanism  on  the  rig  designed  to  stop oil flow has
   malfunctioned,  allowing  millions  of  liters of oil to leak into the
   Gulf of Mexico.

   U.S.  Interior  Secretary  Ken  Salazar  has  said  the accident could
   potentially cause more damage than the 39-million liter oil spill from
   the Exxon Valdez tanker ship in Alaska in 1989.

   Some information for this report was provided by AP, AFP and Reuters.

.