British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on Wednesday rejected suggestions that his government put pressure on Scotland to release the Lockerbie bomber early in an attempt to improve Britain's trade links with Libya.

"On our part, there was no conspiracy, no cover-up, no double-dealing, no deal on oil, no attempt to instruct Scottish ministers, no private assurances by me to (Libyan leader) Colonel (Muammar) Gaddafi," Brown said at an employment summit in Birmingham, central England.

"We were absolutely clear throughout with the Libyans and everyone else that this was a decision for the Scottish government."

Opposition Conservative leader David Cameron said earlier that Britain faced accusations of "double-dealing" over the release of the convicted bomber, Abdel Basset al-Megrahi, promising one thing to Libya and another to the US.

Megrahi, who has terminal prostate cancer, is the only person to have been convicted over the deaths of 270 people in the bombing of a Pan Am passenger plane over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in 1988. Scotland released him on compassionate grounds last month. – Reuters