Bp Oil Spill, Deepwater Drilling | featured news

BP Chief Executive Bob Dudley accused some politicians and the media on Monday of being too hasty to pin all the blame on his company for the devastating Gulf of Mexico spill - and emphasized the need for deep-water drilling.

Months after the nation’s worst oil disaster, the Obama administration will lift its moratorium on deep-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, the White House announced Tuesday morning.

A six-month ban on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico would directly put more than 9,000 people out of work and indirectly affect another 14,000 jobs, according to a memo from the nation's top drilling regulator.

The owner of the Deepwater Horizon rig, which is spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico, on Tuesday criticized President Barack Obama's six-month ban on deepwater drilling.

A co-chairman of the commission that will study the oil spill said it would probably not lift the moratorium on deepwater drilling until next year.