BP has again asked US authorities to halt payments from its settlement agreement over the Deepwater Horizon disaster in a new row over anti-fraud protection.
The oil giant, which returns to court next week for the second phase of the trial into the 2010 spill, wants all payments stopped until new efficiency and accounting controls are put in place by the claims administrator.
The move comes after former FBI director Louis Freeh published his report into claims the compensation payout process had been tainted.
Freeh noted that, while no misconduct had taken place by claims administrator Patrick Juneau, some members of his staff had taken payments for referring compensation cases.
Earlier this year BP had to top up the compensation fund for the disaster by almost £1billion after seeing the £13billion originally set aside fall to less than £200million.
The oil major had originally expected to pay out $7.8billion, but blames excessive fees by the administrator and false claims as having forced up the cost.
“There is no assurance that dishonest and illegitimate claims are being detected and denied,” said BP spokesman Geoff Morrell.
“Payment of such claims would cause BP irreparable injury.”
The 2010 Deepwater Horizon rig explosion killed 11 workers.
The mile-deep Macondo oil well then poured more than 4million barrels of crude into the Gulf of Mexico, fouling coastlines from Texas to Florida.
The bid to block further payments came as seven people were convicted in Alabama of filing false compensation claims.
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