BP Plc shares traded up 1.1 percent at 0931 GMT, outperforming a 0.2 percent rise in the STOXX Europe 600 Oil and Gas index, after Thad Allen, the top US oil spill official said a seep detected about 3 km (1.9 miles) from the well was not caused by a pressure test on the well. The test has stemmed the flow of oil since Thursday, bringing hope to residents in the Gulf region, and to BP investors, that the crisis has turned a corner. The oil spill remains a major political issue and will loom large when British Prime Minister David Cameron meets President Barack Obama in Washington on Tuesday.
Cameron has also agreed to meet with four US senators from New York and New Jersey who have demanded investigations into the release of Libyan intelligence officer Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, who was convicted of the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am flight over Lockerbie, Scotland. Al-Megrahi was released from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds last year on the basis he was terminally ill with cancer and had only a few months to live. BP has confirmed it lobbied the British government in late 2007 over a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya, which could have paved the way for al-Megrahi’s release but it said it was not involved in talks on his final release.
The release was strongly opposed by the Obama administration and by Cameron, who was in opposition at the time. Jason Kenney, oil analyst at ING in Edinburgh, said the issue was being used as another stick with which to beat BP. “(Cameron) should tell the senators to calm down,” he said.
Officials are monitoring the pressure in the well to gauge whether it is structurally sound.
