Al Jazeera Syria Live Blog

Thousands continue to take to the streets across Syria, despite the bloody crackdown on protests. Activists say that thousands of civilians have been killed by security forces. We bring you the latest news from various sources. Read more here

2011–2012 Syrian uprising
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The 2011–2012 Syrian uprising is an ongoing internal conflict in Syria, a part of the wider Arab Spring. Public demonstrations first took place on 26 January 2011, but were only a sporadic occurrence until mass protests erupted in Daraa on 15 March. The situation quickly developed into a full-scale nationwide uprising, with protesters demanding the resignation of President Bashar al-Assad and the overthrow of the government. The situation in Syria is part of the Arab Spring, a wave of social upheaval throughout the Arab World demanding greater political freedom and an end to autocracy. Inspired by the successful revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, Syrian protesters have employed the use of tactics such as marches, hunger strikes, rioting, and vandalism, in a sustained campaign of civil resistance aimed at ending nearly five decades of Ba’athist rule. The uprising was described as "unprecedented" by several political commentators. Read more here

Syria holds vote on new constitution
Al Jazeera
February 26, 2012

Activists doubt charter proposed by President Assad will end five decades of one-party rule at root of ongoing unrest.

Voting is under way in Syria on a new constitution that could theoretically end five decades of one-party rule, amid an call for a boycott of the referendum from opposition activists and a continuing government assault on their strongholds.

Polls opened at 7:00am local time (5:00 GMT) on Sunday, with more than 14 million people over the age of 18 eligible to vote at 13,835 polling stations.

With many parts of the country reeling from weeks of military assault, and army defectors engaged in a guerrilla campaign against loyalist troops, it was unclear how the ballot could prove to be convincing.

Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, unveiled the proposed new national charter earlier this month in his latest reform pledge since protests erupted last March.

The resulting violence has left more than 7,600 people dead, monitors say. Syria blames the violence on "armed terrorist gangs".

Assad has promised to hold parliamentary elections within 90 days if voters approve the new constitution. However, the decision to hold the referendum has failed to ease global pressure on his government. Read more here

She wanted one more story': Mother of veteran war reporter Marie Colvin said her daughter was due to leave Syria on SAME DAY she was killed in rocket attack
Daily Mail - Mail Online
By Charles Walford and Nabila Ramdani
February 23, 2012

The mother of journalist Marie Colvin, who died in a rocket attack in Syria, said her daughter was on the verge of leaving the city because it was so dangerous.

Rosemarie Colvin described her daughter as passionate about her work, even when it got extremely hard.

The 55-year-old Sunday Times reporter died alongside French photographer Remi Ochlik, 28, in a rocket attack on the besieged city of Homs this morning.

Speaking from her home in East Norwich, New York, Mrs Colvin said: 'She was supposed to leave (Syria) today,' adding that her daughter had spoken yesterday with her editor at the Sunday Times who ordered her to leave because it was so dangerous.

Mrs Colvin said: 'She had to stay. She wanted to finish one more story.'

The award-winning journalist was the eldest of five children and is survived by her mother, two sisters and two brothers.

Her mother told reporters: 'The reason I've been talking to all you guys is that I don't want my daughter's legacy to be ''no comment'' ... because she wasn't a ''no comment'' person.'

'Her legacy is: Be passionate and be involved in what you believe in.

'And do it as thoroughly and honestly and fearlessly as you can.' Read more here

Marie Colvin - Sunday Times

Marie Colvin, Wikipedia "My job is to bear witness. I have never been interested in knowing what make of plane had just bombed a village or whether the artillery that fired at it was 120mm or 155mm."

Israel hedges its bets on Syria
Al Jazeera
by Roxanne Horesh
February 14, 2012

Herzliya, Israel - Officials here are waffling over what position to take in response to the Syrian uprising. During the early days of the revolt against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government, officials in Tel Aviv kept a low profile in relation to their northern neighbour. In conventional wisdom, they pursued what has been termed as a policy of "better the devil we know" - that supporting the status quo was better than not knowing what came next. 

Although the Israeli government has been no friend of the Assad administration, policymakers in Tel Aviv maintained a "strategy of silence" towards the Syrian opposition. Given Syria’s perceived geographic vulnerability, and limited military resources, the chances of Assad leading a successful military campaign against Israel are relatively low. The Israel-Syria border has remained rather quiet since 1973. Even when the Israeli army killed 26 Palestinian protesters in June 2011, as they marched towards the border between Syria and the occupied Golan Heights, tensions did not escalate towards a potential conflict between the two states.

Given the recent outburst over containing Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the seeming obsession with a 2012 confrontation, many Israeli officials and analysts have recommended taking a stronger position in support of the Syrian opposition. They view the prospective collapse of the house of Assad through the prism of Israel’s realpolitik, as a way to break the so-called Tehran-Damascus axis and as a means of weakening Hamas, the armed Palestinian group that maintained political offices in Syria’s capital. Tel Aviv reportedly sees the current climate as an opportunity to redraw the map of the region, isolating Iran and bringing Syria into its orbit. Read more here

Blasts in Aleppo as 'tanks mass outside Homs'
Al Jazeera
February 10, 2012

Explosions have rocked Syria's commercial capital, Aleppo, with state media reporting attacks on a military intelligence building and a security forces headquarters.

Syrian state television said two explosions had taken place on Friday morning and blamed the attack on "armed terrorist gangs."

The broadcaster said that 25 people were killed and 175 wounded, including civilians and members of the security forces.

Mangled, bloodied bodies as well as severed limbs lay on the pavement outside the targeted buildings, as shown in live footage on Syrian television. It said one of the blasts targeted a military intelligence centre and the other a security forces building.

The General Commission of the Syrian Revolution, an opposition group, said that the attacks were "staged by the regime," in a statement emailed to the AFP news agency. Read more here

Imperialism, despotism, and democracy in Syria
Al Jazeera
by Joseph Massad
February 6, 2012

The stark choice between a fascist or an imperialist course in Syria should be discarded for a third and better course.

New York, NY - In the context of the US invasion of the Gulf in 1991, British academic Fred Halliday announced his new right-wing affiliations in the British newspaper the New Statesman by declaring: "If I have to choose between imperialism and fascism, I choose imperialism." It never occurred to Halliday that he could have opposed both and supported home-grown democratic struggles instead.

This was indeed a watershed moment for Arab, American, and European anti-imperialist leftists who would become turncoats, moving from a principled opposition to imperialism to a principled and financially more rewarding support of it. Like much of the scholarly and journalistic output of turncoats, Halliday's sober and academically valuable studies, written before his transformation into a pro-imperial apologist, were followed by forgettable and mediocre studies after it, so much so that he did not publish a single study after 1991 that had academic merit or even a shelf life beyond a few weeks (though his Arab turncoat comrades saw fit to translate these later studies to Arabic!).

The stark opposition that Halliday drew between American imperialism and Saddam's despotic rule preceded the events of 9/11 and the re-introduction of the term "fascism" in a slightly altered form to fit US imperialism's new enemies, namely the neologism "Islamofascism", which another British turncoat, Christopher Hitchens, had done so much to disseminate.

At the time, many Arabs, Europeans, and Americans (myself included), who have been unwavering critics of Saddam Hussein's despotic and terroristic rule and US imperialism's genocidal wars against Third World enemies, opposed the first US invasion of the Gulf in 1991 and the ensuing 12-year siege, which cost more than a million Iraqi lives, as well as the subsequent US invasion of Iraq in 2003 and its 8-year occupation of the country, which killed another million Iraqis. Read more here

U.S. Embassy in Syria Closed, Diplomats Evacuated
By KIRIT RADIA | ABC News
February 6, 2012

The United States has whisked its remaining diplomats out of Syria and suspended operations at its embassy in Damascus as violence there continues to increase, U.S. officials told ABC News.

The skeletal staff, including Ambassador Robert Ford, departed quietly despite in some cases being denied exit visas by Syrian authorities, the officials said.

"The recent surge in violence, including bombings in Damascus on Dec. 23 and Jan. 6, has raised serious concerns that our Embassy is not sufficiently protected from armed attack," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said today. "We, along with several other diplomatic missions, conveyed our security concerns to the Syrian government but the regime failed to respond adequately."

The embassy had already drawn down its staffing over the past several months amid concerns about their security. After the latest round of reductions in January a core group of only 17 remained in the country. Some departed overland to Jordan while others flew out of the airport in the capital.

The shuttering of the embassy follows similar steps by other Western countries in recent weeks. A U.S. official said that talks are ongoing with Poland to serve as the American protecting power in Syria while the U.S. embassy is closed.

Today's move comes after the Obama administration says its requests to Syrian authorities for increased security around the American embassy and its diplomats fell on deaf ears. The embassy is situated on a busy intersection in Damascus and officials say they feared al Qaeda elements, which are believed to be behind a string of car bombs in the Syrian capital, could target the Americans next. They had requested that the street the embassy is on be closed, but nothing was done.

The embassy had already been targeted by a pro-Assad mob last July after Ambassador Ford defied restrictions on his travel outside the capital and visited the restive city of Hama. Some in the crowd scaled the outer walls of the embassy and defaced the exterior, including the American flag, before being chased away by embassy guards.

The U.S. embassy, like other diplomatic facilities there, is guarded by Syrian security forces. U.S. officials say they were slow to respond and accused the government of sponsoring the protest.

Similar mobs have targeted Ambassador Ford's convoy when he went to visit a prominent opposition leader in September. Ford and his staff barricade themselves in the leader's office for several hours before Syrian security finally arrived to disperse the crowd. As they left the pro-Assad protestors pelted the cars with rocks, eggs, and tomatoes, damaging one of them significantly, officials said at the time.

The Syrian government's crackdown on the movement to oust President Assad has become increasingly bloody in recent months. The United Nations stopped counting the dead late last month, saying it was too hard to keep up with and verify the body counts. At the time it placed the death toll at more than 5,400. Since then there have been reports of hundreds more killed.

Opposition elements have also stepped up efforts to fight back, raising fears that the once peaceful movement could evolve into a civil war.

Ambassador Ford has been one of the most vocal critics of the Assad government over the past year. In August President Obama called on Assad to step down, and the United States has supported resolutions in the United Nations Security Council that would do the same.

The latest effort at the United Nations, proposed by Morocco and backed by the Arab League, was vetoed on Saturday by Russia and China who have maintained support for President Assad and are reluctant to endorse another resolution that could lead to foreign intervention like in the case of Libya. Read more here

Russia and China Block U.N. Action on Crisis in Syria
The New York Times
By NEIL MacFARQUHAR and ANTHONY SHADID
February 4, 2012

UNITED NATIONS — A United Nations Security Council effort to end the violence in Syria collapsed in acrimony with a double veto by Russia and China on Saturday, hours after the Syrian military attacked the city of Homs in what opposition leaders described as the deadliest government assault in the nearly 11-month uprising.

The veto and the mounting violence underlined the dynamics shaping what is proving to be the Arab world’s bloodiest revolt: diplomatic stalemate and failure as Syria plunges deeper into what many are already calling a civil war. Diplomats have lamented their lack of options in pressuring the Syrian government, and even some Syrian dissidents worry about what the growing confrontation will mean for a country reeling from bloodshed and hardship.

The veto is almost sure to embolden the government of President Bashar al-Assad, which brazenly carried out the assault on Homs on the day that the Security Council had planned to vote. It came, too, around the anniversary of its crackdown in 1982 on another Syrian city, Hama, by Mr. Assad’s father, Hafez, in which at least 10,000 people were killed in one of the bloodiest episodes in modern Arab history. Read more here

Syrian gunmen break artist's hands as 'warning'
Associated Press
By ZEINA KARAM
August 25, 2011

BEIRUT (AP) — A renowned political cartoonist whose drawings expressed Syrians' frustrated hopes for change was grabbed after he left his studio early Thursday and beaten by masked gunmen who broke his hands and dumped him on a road outside Damascus.

One of Syria's most famous artists, Ali Ferzat, 60, earned international recognition and the respect of many Arabs with stinging caricatures that infuriated dictators including Iraq's Saddam Hussein, Libya's Moammar Gadhafi and, particularly in recent months, Syria's autocratic Assad family.

He lay badly bruised in a hospital bed Thursday evening with his hands swathed in bandages, a stark reminder that no Syrian remains immune to a brutal crackdown on a five-month anti-government uprising.

Ferzat remembers the gunmen telling him that "this is just a warning," as they beat him, a relative told The Associated Press. "We will break your hands so that you'll stop drawing," the masked men said, according to the relative, who spoke anonymously for fear of retaliation. Read more here

Dozens die, thousands flee Syrian tank assault in Hama
Reuters
By Khaled Yacoub Oweis
August 4, 2011

AMMAN, Aug 4 Reuters) - Syrian troops killed at least 45 civilians in a tank assault to occupy the center of the besieged city of Hama, residents said on Thursday, seeking to crush an uprising against President Bashar al-Assad's rule.

Thousands of civilians were fleeing the city, a bastion of protest against 41 years of Assad family rule surrounded by a ring of steel of troops with tanks and heavy weapons.

"The sound of tank shelling and their heavy machineguns echoed in Hama all day. We fear many more martyrs. Most people in my neighborhood have fled," said one resident in Sabounia district, a small business owner who did not want to be named.

"The shabbiha (militiamen loyal to Assad) are cleaning the streets near the university campus to stage a pro-Assad march tomorrow as if nothing is happening in Hama," he told Reuters by satellite phone.

Electricity and communications have been cut off and as many as 130 people have been killed in a four-day military assault since Assad, from Syria's minority Alawite sect, sent troops into the city on Sunday, residents and activists say.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Washington believed Assad's forces were responsible for the deaths of more than 2,000 Syrians in their attacks on peaceful protesters. Read more here

Syria - Protests - New York Times

The wave of Arab unrest that started with the Tunisian revolution of January 2011 reached Syria in mid-March, when residents of a small southern city took to the streets to protest the torture of students who had put up anti-government graffiti.

President Bashar al-Assad who inherited Syria's harsh dictatorship from his father, Hafez al-Assad, at first wavered between force and hints of reform. But in April, just days after lifting the country's decades-old state of emergency, he launched the first of what became a series of withering crackdowns, sending tanks into restive cities as security forces opened fire on demonstrators.

Neither the violence nor Mr. Assad's offers of political reform — rejected as shams by protest leaders — brought an end to the unrest. Similarly, the protesters have not been able to withstand direct assault by the military's armored forces. Read more here

19 Americans in Egypt Face Trial in Inquiry Over Funding
The New York Times
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
February 5, 2012

CAIRO — Egyptian authorities have referred 19 Americans and two dozen others to criminal trials, justice ministry officials said Sunday, as part of a politically charged investigation into the foreign financing of nonprofit groups that has shaken the 30-year alliance between the United States and Egypt.

The referral flies in the face of increasingly urgent warnings to Egypt’s military rulers from President Obama, cabinet officials and senior Congressional leaders that the investigation could jeopardize $1.55 billion in expected American aid this year, including $1.3 billion for the military.

On Saturday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said she personally warned the Egyptian foreign minister, Mohammed Amr, during a security conference in Munich. "We are very clear that there are problems that arise from this situation that can impact all the rest of our relationship with Egypt," Mrs. Clinton told reporters there.

Congress requires that before the aid can be released, the State Department must certify that Egypt is making progress toward democracy, including respecting the independence of the civil society groups under investigation. President Obama has personally told Mr. Tantawi that the investigation represents a failure to meet those criteria. Read more here

Human Rights Watch
World Report 2012

This 22nd annual World Report summarizes human rights conditions in more than 90 countries and territories worldwide in 2011. It reflects extensive investigative work that Human Rights Watch staff has undertaken during the year, often in close partnership with domestic human rights activists.

The introductory essay examines the Arab Spring, which has created an extraordinary opportunity for change. The global community has a responsibility to help the longsuppressed people of the region seize control of their destiny from often-brutal authoritarian rulers. Standing firmly with people as they demand their legitimate rights is the best way to stop the bloodshed, while principled insistence on respect for rights is the best way to help these popular movements avoid intolerance, lawlessness, and summary revenge once in power. Read more here

(Cairo, January 22, 2012) -- Many democracies have allowed their ties with repressive allies to temper their support for human rights in the Arab Spring protests, Human Rights Watch said today in its World Report 2012. For reasons of principle and long-term interest, governments should stand firm with the people of the Middle East and North Africa when they demand their basic rights and work to ensure the transition to genuine democracies…

…"The people driving the Arab Spring deserve strong international support to realize their rights and to build genuine democracies," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. "Loyalty to autocratic friends shouldn't stand in the way of siding with democratic reformers. International influence is also needed to ensure that the new governments extend human rights and the rule of law to all, especially women and minorities." Read more here

Tunisian protester

Mohamed Bouazizi’s personal sacrifice sparked a wave of freedom uprisings in the Arab world. Read more about Mohamed’s life and heroism.

The Dictator's Handbook: Why Bad Behavior is Almost Always Good Politics

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita, Co-Author
Alastair Smith, Co-Author

For eighteen years, Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith have been part of a team revolutionizing the study of politics by turning conventional wisdom on its head. They start from a single assertion: Leaders do whatever keeps them in power. They don’t care about the "national interest"—or even their subjects—unless they have to.

This clever and accessible book shows that the difference between tyrants and democrats is just a convenient fiction. Governments do not differ in kind but only in the number of essential supporters, or backs that need scratching. The size of this group determines almost everything about politics: what leaders can get away with, and the quality of life or misery under them. The picture the authors paint is not pretty. But it just may be the truth, which is a good starting point for anyone seeking to improve human governance. Read more here

After Words with Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith

C-SPAN 2, BookTV

September 27, 2011

The acclaimed NYU professors explain how autocrats and dictators are able to maintain power by doing whatever is necessary to please the coalition that will help continue their regime. They explore their theory with Associated Press National Security Editor Anne Gearan. Read more here

2011 Yemeni protests
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The 2011 Yemeni protests followed the initial stages of the Tunisian Revolution and occurred simultaneously with the Egyptian Revolution and other mass protests in the Arab world in early 2011. The protests were initially against unemployment, economic conditions and corruption, as well as against the government's proposals to modify the constitution of Yemen. The protesters' demands then escalated to calls for President Ali Abdullah Saleh to resign.

A major demonstration of over 16,000 protesters took place in Sana'a on 27 January. On 2 February, President Saleh announced he would not run for reelection in 2013 and that he would not pass power to his son. On 3 February, 20,000 people protested against the government in Sana'a, others protested in Aden, in a "Day of Rage" called for by Tawakel Karman, while soldiers, armed members of the General People's Congress and many protectors held a pro-government rally in Sana'a. In a "Friday of Anger" on 18 February, tens of thousands of Yemenis took part in antigovernment demonstrations in Taiz, Sana'a and Aden. On a "Friday of No Return" on 11 March, protesters called for the ousting of President Ali Abdullah Saleh in Sana'a where three people were killed. More protests were held in other cities, including Al Mukalla, where one person was killed. On 18 March, protesters in Sana'a were fired upon resulting in over 40 deaths and ultimately culminating in mass defections and resignations. Read more here

Libyan Civil War
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Libyan civil war (also referred to as the Libyan Revolution and the Libyan Uprising), was an armed conflict in the North African state of Libya, fought between forces loyal to Colonel Muammar Gaddafi and those seeking to oust his government. The war was preceded by protests in Benghazi beginning on 15 February 2011, which led to clashes with security forces that fired on the crowd. The protests escalated into a rebellion that spread across the country, with the forces opposing Gaddafi establishing an interim governing body, the National Transitional Council.

The United Nations Security Council passed an initial resolution on 26 February, freezing the assets of Gaddafi and his inner circle and restricting their travel, and referred the matter to the International Criminal Court for investigation. In early March, Gaddafi's forces rallied, pushed eastwards and re-took several coastal cities before attacking Benghazi. A further U.N. resolution authorized member states to establish and enforce a no-fly zone over Libya, and to use "all necessary measures" to prevent attacks on civilians. The Gaddafi government then announced a ceasefire, but failed to uphold it. Read more here

Al Jazeera

As the uprising in Libya continues, we update you with the latest developments from our correspondents, news agencies and citizens across the globe.

Gaddafi is dead

Muammar Gaddafi killed as Sirte falls
Al Jazeera
October 20, 2011

Muammar Gaddafi has been killed after National Transitional Council fighters overran loyalist defences in Sirte, the toppled Libyan leader's hometown and final stronghold.

"We have been waiting for this moment for a long time. Muammar Gaddafi has been killed," Mahmoud Jibril, the de facto Libyan prime minister, told reporters on Thursday in Tripoli, the capital.

Crowds took to the streets of Tripoli and Benghazi, the eastern city that spearheaded the uprising against Gaddafi's 42-year rule in February, to celebrate the news, with some firing guns and waving Libya's new flag.

Abdul Hakim Belhaj, an NTC military chief, said Gaddafi had died of his wounds after being captured on Thursday. Read more here

New York Times Slide Show Battle for Libya

Timeline of Muammar Gaddafi (1942-2011)



Violent End to an Era as Qaddafi Dies in Libya
The New York Times
by KAREEM FAHIM, ANTHONY SHADID and RICK GLADSTONE
October 20, 2011

MISURATA, Libya — Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s last moments Thursday were as violent as the uprising that overthrew him.

In a cellphone video that went viral on the Internet, the deposed Libyan leader is seen splayed on the hood of a truck and then stumbling amid a frenzied crowd, seemingly begging for mercy. He is next seen on the ground, with fighters grabbing his hair. Blood pours down his head, drenching his golden brown khakis, as the crowd shouts, "God is great!"

Colonel Qaddafi’s body was shown in later photographs, with bullet holes apparently fired into his head at what forensic experts said was close range, raising the possibility that he was executed by anti-Qaddafi fighters. Read more here

Libya S.O.S. blog

Central Bank of Libya (was) 100% owned by state (since 1956) and is thus outside of multinational corporation control (BIS-Banking International Settlement rules for private interests). The state can finance its own projects and do so without interest rates, which reduce the costs by half of private banks. Libya’s central bank (with three branches in the east including Benghazi) has 144 tons of gold in its vaults, which it could use to start the gold dinar. (China, Russia, India, Iran are stocking great sums of gold rather than relying only on dollars.) Read more here

United States of Africa
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The United States of Africa is a proposed name for the concept of a federation of some or all of the 55 sovereign states of Africa.

Former Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi, who was the 2009 Chairperson of the African Union (AU), advanced the idea of a United States of Africa at two regional African summits: in June 2007 in Conakry, Guinea, and again in February 2009 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Gaddafi had previously pushed for the creation of the African Union at a summit in Lomé, Togo, in 2000. Having described the AU as a failure on a number of occasions, Gaddafi asserted that only a true pan-African state can provide stability and wealth to Africa.

A number of senior AU members also support the proposed federation, believing that it could bring peace to a 'new' Africa. Alpha Oumar Konaré, former President of Mali and former Chairperson of the African Union Commission, spoke in favour of the concept at the commemoration of Africa Day, on May 25, 2006. 

Gaddafi

"In 1986, 2000, and the months prior to the 2011 Libyan civil war, Gaddafi announced plans for a unified African gold dinar currency, to challenge the dominance of the US dollar and Euro currencies. The African dinar would have been measured directly in terms of gold, which would mean a country’s wealth would depend on how much gold it had rather than how many dollars it traded, allowing a greater sharing of the wealth and self-determination in Africa. This has led some Africans to believe that, because it may have disrupted the dollar-dominated world economy, this may have been a reason for NATO's 2011 military intervention in Libya against Gaddafi." 

Marcus Garvey in 1924

Origins

The "United States of Africa" was mentioned first by Marcus Garvey in his poem 'Hail, United States of Africa' in 1924. Garvey's ideas deeply influenced the birth of the Pan-Africanist movement which culminated in 1945 with the Fifth Pan-African Congress in Manchester, United Kingdom, attended by W. E. B. Du Bois, Patrice Lumumba, George Padmore, Jomo Kenyatta, and Kwame Nkrumah. Later, Nkrumah and Haile Selassie (among many others) took the idea forward to form the 37 nation Organisation of African Unity, the forerunner of today's African Union.

The idea of a multinational unifying African state is seen by the French publication Le Monde diplomatique as a successor to the medieval African empires: the Ethiopian Empire, the Ghana Empire, the Mali Empire, the Songhai Empire, the Benin Empire, the Kanem Empire, and other historic nation states.

Demographics

From these origins, and as a result of the more recent colonialism, Africa has today developed into a continent of 55 independent countries, with a population of 1 billion. The proposed federation would have the largest total territory of any state, exceeding the Russian Federation. It would also be the third most populous state after China and India, and with a population speaking an estimated 2,000 languages. Read more here

Gaddafi asset hunters face legal mazes
Reuters
by Mark Hosenball
October 21, 2011

(Reuters) - Libya's new leaders will have to dig deep to find billions of dollars in cash and assets that Muammar Gaddafi and his family stashed around the world, and then will face daunting legal hurdles to recover them all, experts said on Friday.

About $19 billion in assets believed to have been under the control of Gaddafi or associates have been located and frozen by the United Nations and member countries, U.S. officials have said since rebel forces began fighting to oust him from power.

But other estimates suggest Gaddafi controlled as much as $30 billion in assets in the United States alone, plus large holdings in Europe and South Africa, said Victor Comras, a former money laundering expert for the United Nations and U.S. State Department. Read more here

An anti-Gaddafi fighter stand guard at the Wadi Dinar checkpoint

Libyan tanks strike Sirte loyalists
Reuters
By Alexander Dziadosz
and Sherine El Madany
September 26, 2011

SIRTE (Reuters) - Tanks manned by fighters for Libya's interim government shelled loyalists holding out in Muammar Gaddafi's hometown on Monday as NATO jets circled overhead, ready to renew air strikes on the besieged coastal city of Sirte.

While anti-Gaddafi forces which have advanced from the west held their ground, firing from two tanks positioned about 2 km (2,000 yards) from the center of the sprawling desert town, a sharp push forward on the eastern front by scores of armed pick-up trucks raised spirits among the attackers.

Sirte, where NATO aircraft hit targets on Sunday, lies between Tripoli and the eastern city of Benghazi, both now held by the National Transitional Council (NTC), whose rebel fighters overran the capital five weeks ago after six months of fighting.

Taking Sirte would be a huge boost for the NTC as it tries to establish credibility as a government able to unite Libya's fractious tribes and regions, and a blow for Gaddafi, widely believed to be in hiding somewhere in Libya. Read more here

The Surreal Ruins of Qaddafi’s Never-Never Land
The New York Times
by ROBERT F. WORTH
September 21, 2011

On the evening of Aug. 23, during the final hours of the battle for Tripoli, a 26-year-old lawyer named Mustafa Abdullah Atiri was lying, exhausted, against the back wall of a filthy tin-roofed warehouse crammed with 150 prisoners. He had been beaten and tortured every day since Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi’s soldiers arrested him four days earlier. It was just after the muezzin’s first call to evening prayer — about 10 minutes before 8 — when a pair of guards walked to the door, raised their AK-47 rifles and began spraying the men with bullets. Another guard threw a grenade into the densely packed crowd. Bodies fell on top of Atiri with the first fusillade, protecting him from the blast. Then the guards opened fire again. Blood began seeping down from the bodies above, soaking his jeans. As the officers walked back across the yard to reload, a guard named Abdel Razaq, who had shown the men some small mercies over the previous days, went to the door and shouted at the survivors: "Run! Run!" Read more here

Unseemly Scramble For Libya’s Post-Gaddafi Oil Assets Underway
Zero Hedge
Guest Post by John Daly
September 5, 2011

While NATO members, led by France, piously proclaimed at the onset of their military offensive in Libya that their concerns were solely humanitarian, a covert tussle to gain a commanding lead in developing the country’s energy riches in light of Colonel Gaddafi’s departure is well underway.

The Libyan economy depends primarily upon revenues from the oil sector, which contribute about 95 percent of export earnings, 25 percent of GDP, and 80 percent of government revenue. Prior to the outbreak of conflict, Libya was exporting about 1.3-1.4 million barrels per day from production estimated at roughly 1.79 million barrels per day, of which approximately 280,000 barrels per day were indigenously consumed. But analysts believe that with reconstruction Libya could soon be exporting 1.6 million barrels per day of high-quality, light crude. Read more here

Libya's Post Gadhaffi Future - Who Gets The Oil?
OilPrice.com
by John Daly 
August 24, 2011

Muammar Gadhaffi’s 42 year-old regime is in its death rattle – maybe today, maybe tomorrow, his administration that has ruled Libya with a quixotic and brutal hand is about to pass, in Trotsky’s piquant phrase, "into the dustbin of history," prompting the question "what next?"

The glittering prize is Libya’s 1.6 million barrels per day output of high quality crude, which accounted for about 2 percent of global oil output drawn from Africa's largest oil reserves, whose exports have been stymied since the NATO-led campaign began six months ago. Projecting into the future, analysts believe that has reserves to sustain its previous level of production for 80 years. Read more here

Price on Gaddafi's head as fighting goes on
Reuters
By Missy Ryan and Ulf Laessing
August 24, 2011

(Reuters) - Libya's new masters offered a million-dollar bounty for the fugitive Muammar Gaddafi on Wednesday, after he urged his men to carry on a battle that kept the capital in a state of fear.

A day after rebel forces overran his Tripoli headquarters and trashed the symbols of his 42-year dictatorship, rocket and machinegun fire from pockets of loyalists kept the irregular fighters at bay as they tried to hunt down Gaddafi and his sons.

Western leaders who backed the revolt with NATO air power remained wary of declaring outright victory while the 69-year-old Gaddafi is at large. He issued a rambling but defiant audio message overnight to remaining bastions of his supporters, some of whom may be tempted to mount an Iraq-style insurgency.

But the international powers and the rebel government-in-waiting in the eastern city of Benghazi lost no time in making arrangements for a handover of Libya's substantial foreign assets. Funds will be required to bring relief to war-battered towns and to develop oil reserves that can make Libya rich. Read more here

Our disturbing relationship with Gaddafi
Reuters
By Mark Ensalaco
August 23, 2011

The opinions expressed are his own.

Thomas Jefferson once said "rebellion against tyrants is obedience to God."

The Arab Spring is reminding the world that struggles for dignity, freedom, justice and human rights spring from our deepest aspirations as human beings. At the same time the dictatorial violence in Syria and Libya remind us of the evil that springs from the insatiable will to absolute power.

The repression in Syria has claimed more than 2,200 lives according to the United Nations. Thankfully, the bloodshed is coming to an end in Libya, but it must be remembered that in Libya, unlike Tunisia and Egypt, it took a bloody civil war and NATO intervention to destroy the decades-long tyranny of Muammar Gaddafi.

Events in Libya compel us to reflect on fundamental moral questions that are larger than geopolitics and the price of petroleum. But it is impossible to reflect on those moral questions without scrutinizing the compromising attitudes that stem from our acute concerns about national security and access to cheap oil.

In September 2004 the United States lifted economic sanctions leveled against the Gaddafi regime in response to its most egregious act of terror — the destruction of Pan 103 in December 1988. The Bush administration restored full diplomatic relations two years later. It is hard, looking at the bloodshed in Libya today, to reconcile the Bush administration’s rapprochement with Gaddafi with American values. Read more here

Libyan rebels in Tripoli's central square
Al Jazeera
August 22, 2011

Euphoric Libyan rebels have moved into the centre of the capital, Tripoli, as Muammar Gaddafi's defenders melted away and thousands of jubilant civilians rushed out of their homes to cheer the long convoys of pickup trucks packed with fighters shooting in the air.

The rebels' surprising and speedy leap forward, after six months of largely deadlocked civil war, was packed into just a few dramatic hours. By nightfall on Sunday, they had advanced more than 32km to Tripoli.

Zeina Khodr, Al Jazeera's correspondent, said from the Green Square: "There's a party in the Libyan capital tonight. The people are in charge of the city. They've decided the square is now called Martyr's Square, the original name. They're shouting 'we're free' and shooting at a poster of Gaddafi." Read more here

The Battle For Libya Is Almost Over... As Is The Battle For Its 144 Tons Of Gold
Zero Hedge
by Tyler Durden
August 21, 2011

Following a 6 month stalemate in which neither side had attained any advantage, it suddenly took just a few days for the Libyan rebel forces to steamroll unopposed into Tripoli. While we are confident that the political aftermath of this outcome will be very much comparable to what is happening in Egypt right now, many wonder why it is that the Libyan situation has progressed with such speed. Perhaps the answer can be found in the 143.8 tons of gold held by the Libyan Central Bank. Granted it is nowhere near close the 366 tons of gold that Venezuela supposedly has per the WGC, most of it likely held offshore and not being repatriated, the question of where the global gold cartel may find some of the much needed physical to satisfy Chavez' demands has been now answered. Of course we assume that said gold has not already departed Libya in direction Caracas over the past 6 months. Which, in retrospect, we probably should, as it would explain why gold is now at $1875 and rapidly rising. Read more here

Volunteers keep rebellion against Gaddafi alive
Reuters
By Sherine El Madany
June 9, 2011
BENGHAZI, Libya

As the war against Muammar Gaddafi drags on, rebel stocks of food and functioning weapons are dwindling and an army of volunteers has emerged to keep the campaign afloat.

Restaurant staff cook around the clock to provide free meals for the front line. Teachers, schoolchildren and doctors have put on greasy overalls to repair and maintain rebel weaponry.

"We work with one goal in mind -- to end Gaddafi's rule as soon as possible, even with just a twist of a spanner," said Gadallah el-Kadiky, 43, who dropped his job as a truck driver after the uprising against Gaddafi began in February.

Kadiky and his two teenage sons spend 12 hours each day at an arms depot on the edge of insurgent-held Benghazi repairing rebel vehicles damaged in skirmishes with Gaddafi troops in the desert expanses further west.

The boys hand him spanners and wrenches as he works to fix as many as five of the vehicles per day. Trained mechanics in blue overalls offer words of advice.

Around 100 volunteers at the depot strip down weapons, most of them the spoils of battle, repair and clean them for new service or recycle spare parts to make new guns.

They work fast under a hot sun, stepping gingerly among piles of metal, screwdrivers, bolts and wrenches scattered on the ground. Many wear name tags bearing the caption "Grandchildren of Omar al-Mukhtar," the hero of Libyan resistance against Italian colonizers. Read more

Tim Hetherington

Tim Hetherington, 40, killed in Libya
Vanity Fair
by David Friend
April 20, 2011

Tim Hetherington, photojournalist, filmmaker, and Vanity Fair contributing photographer, was killed today while covering the conflict in Misrata, Libya. "Tim died about two hours ago," said Peter N. Bouckaert, of Human Rights Watch, in Geneva, a friend of Hetherington’s. "Three other journalists were also hit [in an] R.P.G. attack, one being Getty photographer Chris Hondros [who was seriously wounded]; photographer Guy Martin, of the Panos Agency, who is in very serious condition; and a freelancer, Michael Brown, who is slightly wounded."

The U.K.-born, Brooklyn-based Hetherington, 40, who had dual British and American citizenship, was best known for his work in Afghanistan, much of it shot for Vanity Fair. In 2007, he won the coveted World Press Photo of the Year Award for his coverage of American soldiers in the Korengal Valley—one of four World Press prizes he received. Those assignments in Afghanistan served as the basis of the 2010 Oscar-nominated documentary Restrepo, which he directed with Vanity Fair contributor (and his longtime journalistic collaborator) Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm. The film was recognized for its decidedly apolitical approach to the war. Hetherington also created short films about the G.I.’s he encountered in the Korengal and released a book of photographs, Infidel, examining the lives of the men of a battle company of the 173rd Airborne. Read more here

In a Medical Tent in Libya, a Grim Procession
The New York Times
by C.J. Chivers
April 17, 2011

MISURATA, Libya — Jinan Hussein Jweil rested on her back on a gurney inside the triage tent. Either a bullet or a piece of whizzing shrapnel had struck the 5-year-old high on the right side of her head. A Libyan and Italian medical team worked to save her. It was not certain they could. "Her brain is out," said Dr. Abdullah Juwid, a surgeon.

As the ugly math of a midsize city suffering a siege would have it, Dr. Juwid was both a doctor in an overcrowded triage tent and an uncle of this wounded child. He had no time to dwell on her case. A pickup truck skidded to a stop outside. Several rebel fighters carried their bullet-riddled friend through the entrance flap. The man appeared to have been in his 20s. He had been shot through both legs and squarely in his chest and mouth. His pupils were fixed. "Maybe he is dead," another doctor said, as their assistants cut away the man’s clothes. The assistants stopped. There was no point in searching for more wounds. "He is killed," one of them said. Read more here

Migrants forced to fight for Gaddafi
Al Jazeera
by Anna Branthwaite
April 9, 2011

'They said we must stay to fight when the Americans come,' a Ghanaian worker tells Al Jazeera from a refugee camp.

Among the reports of atrocities occurring in Libya are claims from African migrants that they were abducted and forced to fight with Gaddafi's forces.

Nearly all migrants from sub-Saharan Africa, who arrive at the desert refugee camp in Tunisia, have fled in fear of violent reprisals by Libyans who accuse them of being mercenaries. The extent to which Gaddafi's military has used foreign mercenaries, or press-ganged migrants into fighting, remains unclear.

A former Nigerian police officer, who had worked in Libya for eight years as a technician, alleges he was abducted in mid-March at a military checkpoint in Tripoli, along with other men from Ghana, Mali and Niger, before being taken to a military centre.

"There was up to 100 people in the courtyard and military trucks were arriving and leaving with more people. They started beating people, I saw them shoot one Ghanaian in front of me. The atmosphere was very intimidating," he explained. "They put us into a vehicle and we were driven into the desert. I saw an oil refinery, there was evidence of bomb strikes, burnt out vehicles and a strong smell. I think it was Ras Lanouf."

A Ghanaian worker claimed to have been abducted by Libyan military when they stormed his house in Sirte.

"They asked us why we were trying to leave the country and that we must stay to fight for when the Americans come," he explained. "We were taken to a police station and then to an underground hospital which they ordered us to clean." Read more here

Libyan rebels and residents flee Ajdabiya
Al Jazeera
April 8, 2011

Groups of Libyan rebels and civilians have fled from the eastern town of Ajdabiya after a rebel armoured unit was hit by apparent NATO air strikes, allowing government troops to advance.

Families packed into cars and lorries on Thursday and joined rebel military vehicles in a convoy heading northeast towards the de facto opposition capital of Benghazi, around 160km away.

Libyan state television claimed that forces loyal to longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi had entered Ajdabiya, but residents said they could see no sign of them.

The retreat began soon after rebel tanks were hit by an air strike around midday near the key oil town of Brega, 80km west of Ajdabiya. Many rebel fighters remained in the town along with doctors at the hospital, after its patients were evacuated to Benghazi as a precaution, Ajdabiya Hospital administrator Majbali Yunis said.

Another hospital official, Mohamed Idris, said at least five people were killed and 22 injured in the strike, including some with serious burns.

Al Jazeera's Laurence Lee, reporting from Benghazi, said that after the initial assumption that it must have been a friendly fire incident, a separate story had emerged that maybe it was not a NATO strike.

"Maybe it was a light plane, presumably hired by Gaddafi's forces, which hit the tanks," he said.

"Whichever way you look at it, it's not very good for the rebels. Clearly if it was NATO, that demonstrates once again the enormous rift in communication between the rebels and NATO. If NATO says 'no, it wasn't us,' then you can only assume that Gaddafi is getting weaponry and indeed light aircraft from abroad. Read more here

NATO admits deadly airstrike but blames Libyan rebels
McClatchy Newspapers
By Shashank Bengali

April 8, 2011

BENGHAZI, Libya — The deputy commander of NATO forces in Libya acknowledged Friday that the alliance struck rebel tanks outside the eastern oil town of Brega a day earlier but blamed the deadly incident on a lack of communication from the rebels.

Rear Adm. Russell Harding said "it would appear that two of our strikes yesterday may have resulted in the deaths of a number of TNC forces," referring to the Transitional National Council, the rebels' de facto government. Doctors said that at least five people were killed in the Thursday morning strike, the second friendly fire incident in less than a week involving NATO forces and the rebels battling Libyan strongman Muammar Gadhafi. Read more here

The roots of indecision: Obama and Libya
Al Jazeera
by Russell A. Berman
April 7, 2011

The Obama administration has yet to find its footing amidst the political tremblings across the Middle East. And Washington's reactions have been inconsistent.

When the Green Movement called for democracy in Iran, Obama signaled to the Tehran leadership that he would stand aloof.

Yet when long-standing American ally Hosni Mubarak of Egypt faced demonstrations, Obama quickly called for him to resign. Servility toward enemies and abandonment of friends seems to be the watchword for American foreign policy: except of course with that old friend Saudi Arabia, whose invasion of Bahrain evoked no US protests.

Most egregiously, Obama delayed any decision regarding Libya until Gaddafi was on the verge of crushing his opponents. Confusion as far as the eye can see.

No wonder. Washington lacks much ability to grasp these political dynamics, in part because of the systematic degradation of intelligence capabilities that has been underway in the US since the post-Vietnam era.

One can genuinely take the US government at its word when it proclaims that it has very little insight into the identity of the Libyan rebels. The term "clueless" comes to mind. Read more here

Former CIA officer blows lid off Libya fraud live on CNN

The American Dream
Prison Planet
April 4, 2011

This Is What Happens When Establishment Control Of The Media Cracks For A Moment

Every once in a while, establishment control of the mainstream media cracks for a moment.  In an effort to achieve higher ratings, mainstream news programs will invite guests on that promise to be "interesting", but then they will say something that is not part of the script and the entire system will go into a state of chaos for a moment. One example of this happened recently when two CNN "infobabes" interviewed former CIA officer Michael Scheuer about the situation on the ground in Libya. They asked Scheuer some questions regarding the role of the CIA in Libya, but the interview rapidly moved in some directions that the "infobabes" were not anticipating.  Instead of sticking to the "Republican" or the "Democrat" script, Scheuer ripped both parties and he detailed many of the reasons why we should have never gone into Libya at all. Read more here

Nato 'friendly fire' strike kills 13 rebels and wounds seven, but leaders say air support must continue against defiant Gaddafi
DailyMail, Mail Online
by Richard Hartley-Parkinson
April 3, 2011

A Nato-led air strike has killed 13 Libyan rebels in a 'regrettable incident' last night, according to a rebel spokesman.

In an increasingly chaotic battle with Muammar Gaddafi's forces over the oil town of Brega, the air strike is said to have hit several vehicles carrying rebel fighters on Friday night.

Yet, despite the deaths on Friday night, the rebel leadership called for continued air strikes against Gaddafi's forces, which have reversed a rebel advance on the coastal road linking their eastern stronghold with western Libya.

At least four burnt-out vehicles, including an ambulance, could be seen at the strike site near the eastern entrance to the town. Read more here

'No immunity' for Libyan foreign minister
Al Jazeera
March 31, 2011

UK foreign minister says Moussa Koussa, once Gaddafi's spy chief, is "distressed and dissatisfied" by events in Libya.

Moussa Koussa, the former Libyan foreign minister who resigned his position and fled to the UK, has not been offered immunity from prosecution and is "voluntarily talking" to authorities, William Hague, Britain's foreign minister, has said.

Koussa was staying in a safe and secure place and engaged in ongoing discussions with British diplomats, including some who worked at the now-shuttered embassy in Libya, Hague said. "His [Koussa's] resignation shows that [Muammar] Gaddafi's regime ... is fragmented, under pressure and crumbling from within," he said.

Hague said Koussa had been his contact with the regime in recent weeks and that he had spoken with him several times. "One thing I gathered between the lines of my telephone calls ... was that he was very distressed and dissatisfied" by the regime's response to protests, Hague said.

A Libyan government spokesman confirmed on Thursday that Koussa had resigned but said that Gaddafi still enjoyed the support of his people. Moussa Ibrahim said that Koussa's decision was personal and "other people will step in and do the job".

Ibrahim says Koussa had been given permission to go to Tunisia because he was sick with diabetes and high blood pressure. He said the goverment did not know he would go to London.

On Thursday, a second top official said he would not serve in Gaddfai's regime. Ali Abdessalam Treki, a former foreign minister and UN general assembly president, had been named to epresent Libya at the UN after a wave of defections early in the uprising. Treki, who is currently in Cairo, said in a statement posted on several opposition websites that he was not going to accept that job or any other. "We should not let our country fall into an unknown fate," he said. "It is our nation's right to live in freedom, democracy and a good life."

Lockerbie questions

Scottish authorities said on Thursday that they wished to interview Koussa over the 1988 Lockerbie bombing. "We have notified the Foreign and Commonwealth Office that the Scottish prosecuting and investigating authorities wish to interview Mr Koussa in connection with the Lockerbie bombing," Scotland's crown office said in a statement. "The investigation into the Lockerbie bombing remains open and we will pursue all relevant lines of inquiry."

The bombing over the Scottish town in 1988 killed 259 people, mostly Americans, on the plane and 11 on the ground.

Last month, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the former Libyan justice minister and leader of the rebel's interim national council, said that Gaddafi ordered intelligence officers, including the convicted bomber Abdel Baset al Megrahi, to carry out the bombing.

Jim Swire, whose daughter Flora was among those killed, said Koussa's arrival in Britain was an opportunity to finally shed some light on the bombing. "Koussa was at the centre of Gaddafi's inner circle. This is a guy who knows everything," he said. "I think this is a fantastic day for those who seek the truth about Lockerbie. He could tell us everything the Gaddafi regime knows."

Read more on Al Jazeera

Gaddafi's forces battle rebels for Brega
Al Jazeera
March 31, 2011

NATO to investigate reports that at least 40 civilians have been killed in air strikes over Tripoli.

Troops loyal to Muammar Gaddafi have continued their advance against pro-democracy fighters as they moved eastwards toward Brega.

Brega is one of several oil towns along the fiercely contested coastal strip. Ras Lanuf and Es Sider, west of Brega, have both been retaken by Gaddafi's forces. Zueitina, east of Brega, is still in rebel hands.

Some rebel forces fell back on Wednesday as far as the town of Ajdabiya, the gateway to the east about 150 kilometres south of the rebel stronghold of Benghazi. Ajdabiya was still in rebel hands on Thursday.

For several weeks pro-democracy fighters and forces loyal to Gaddafi have been fighting across a strip of land between Ajdabiya and Bin Jawad.

Rebels armed mainly with pick-ups mounted with machine guns, rocket-propelled grenade launchers and AK-47 assault rifles have been unable to hold on to gains despite almost two weeks of air strikes by coalition forces.

Brega and Misurata reportedly came under heavy attack from Gaddafi's forces on Thursday, with the frontline moving closer to Ajdabiya.

Misurata – the last major rebel stronghold in western Libya – has been encircled by pro-Gaddafi forces for weeks and repeated coalition air strikes aimed at protecting civilians there have not stopped them. Read more on Al Jazeera

Col. el-Qaddafi

On Libya’s Revolutionary Road
The New York Times
by ROBERT F. WORTH
March 30, 2011

On the evening of Feb. 8, Khalid Saih found himself in the back of a speeding car on the outskirts of Tripoli. It was not by choice. Saih, a lanky 36-year-old lawyer, was part of a small group of Libyan activists who were openly calling for a new constitution and more civil rights. After months of harassment by the police, he and three fellow lawyers were ordered to report to the Interior Ministry in Tripoli. From there, with no warning, they were bundled into a car and told they would be meeting the Leader.

The men were terrified. None had met Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi before. All of them had friends or relatives who had been tortured or murdered in his prisons. As they rode, they made contact with friends back in their hometown, Benghazi, to report their location, in case they were imprisoned or killed. To calm their nerves, they recited a prayer that is invoked in situations of great danger:

God is great,
God the dearest of all Creation,
God is greater than what I fear,
I take refuge in God,
There is no protection but he from the evil servant and his soldiers,
God be my protector from the bulk of their evil.

After a half-hour they arrived at a gated compound with a sign marked in Arabic "Equestrian Club of Abu Sitteh." There were uniformed guards with guns and layers of barbed wire. The car stopped, and a man took the lawyers’ cellphones and escorted them to a large Bedouin-style tent, illuminated by an enormous bonfire in front. They went in and sat down at a long, dimly lighted table. An attendant brought them glasses of fresh camel’s milk. Then Qaddafi entered, wearing brown Bedouin robes and a fur hat with flaps hanging down the sides. With him were two of his top security aides, Abdullah al-Sanousi and Ahmed Qaddaf al-Dam, both well-known and feared men. The Leader shook the lawyers’ hands and joined them at the head of the table. Read more here

Washington in Fierce Debate on Arming Libyan Rebels

The New York Times
By Mark Landler, Elizabeth Bumiller and Steven Lee Myers
March 29, 2011

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is engaged in a fierce debate over whether to supply weapons to the rebels in Libya, senior officials said on Tuesday, with some fearful that providing arms would deepen American involvement in a civil war and that some fighters may have links to Al Qaeda.

The debate has drawn in the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon, these officials said, and has prompted an urgent call for intelligence about a ragtag band of rebels who are waging a town-by-town battle against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, from a base in eastern Libya long suspected of supplying terrorist recruits.

"Al Qaeda in that part of the country is obviously an issue," a senior official said.
 
On a day when Libyan forces counterattacked, fears about the rebels surfaced publicly on Capitol Hill on Tuesday when the military commander of NATO, Adm. James G. Stavridis, told a Senate hearing that there were "flickers" in intelligence reports about the presence of Qaeda and Hezbollah members among the anti-Qaddafi forces. No full picture of the opposition has emerged, Admiral Stavridis said. While eastern Libya was the center of Islamist protests in the late 1990s, it is unclear how many groups retain ties to Al Qaeda.

The French government, which has led the international charge against Colonel Qaddafi, has placed mounting pressure on the United States to provide greater assistance to the rebels. The question of how best to support the opposition dominated an international conference about Libya on Tuesday in London.

While Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the administration had not yet decided whether to actually transfer arms, she reiterated that the United States had a right to do so, despite an arms embargo on Libya, because of the United Nations Security Council’s broad resolution authorizing military action to protect civilians.

In a reflection of the seriousness of the administration’s debate, Mr. Obama said Tuesday that he was keeping his options open on arming the rebels. "I’m not ruling it out, but I’m also not ruling it in," Mr. Obama told NBC News. "We’re still making an assessment partly about what Qaddafi’s forces are going to be doing. Keep in mind, we’ve been at this now for nine days." Read more here

Obama’s Remarks on Libya
The New York Times
March 28, 2011

Following is a text of President Obama's prepared remarks to the public on the American involvement in the war in Libya, as released by the White House on Monday night:

Good evening. Tonight, I'd like to update the American people on the international effort that we have led in Libya – what we have done, what we plan to do, and why this matters to us.

I want to begin by paying tribute to our men and women in uniform who, once again, have acted with courage, professionalism and patriotism. They have moved with incredible speed and strength. Because of them and our dedicated diplomats, a coalition has been forged and countless lives have been saved. Meanwhile, as we speak, our troops are supporting our ally Japan, leaving Iraq to its people, stopping the Taliban's momentum in Afghanistan, and going after al Qaeda around the globe. As Commander-in-Chief, I am grateful to our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, Coast Guardsmen, and their families, as are all Americans.

Read more here

Wow That Was Fast! Libyan Rebels Have Already Established A New Central Bank Of Libya
The Economic Collapse Blog
by Michael T. Snyder, Esq.
March 29, 2011

The rebels in Libya are in the middle of a life or death civil war and Moammar Gadhafi is still in power and yet somehow the Libyan rebels have had enough time to establish a new Central Bank of Libya and form a new national oil company. Perhaps when this conflict is over those rebels can become time management consultants. They sure do get a lot done. What a skilled bunch of rebels - they can fight a war during the day and draw up a new central bank and a new national oil company at night without any outside help whatsoever. If only the rest of us were so versatile! But isn't forming a central bank something that could be done after the civil war is over? According to Bloomberg, the Transitional National Council has "designated the Central Bank of Benghazi as a monetary authority competent in monetary policies in Libya and the appointment of a governor to the Central Bank of Libya, with a temporary headquarters in Benghazi." Apparently someone felt that it was very important to get pesky matters such as control of the banks and control of the money supply out of the way even before a new government is formed. Read more here

Libyan Rebel Council Forms Oil Company to Replace Qaddafi’s
Bloomberg
by Bill Varner
March 22, 2011

Libyan rebels in Benghazi said they have created a new national oil company to replace the corporation controlled by leader Muammar Qaddafi whose assets were frozen by the United Nations Security Council.

The Transitional National Council released a statement announcing the decision made at a March 19 meeting to establish the "Libyan Oil Company as supervisory authority on oil production and policies in the country, based temporarily in Benghazi, and the appointment of an interim director general" of the company.

The Council also said it "designated the Central Bank of Benghazi as a monetary authority competent in monetary policies in Libya and the appointment of a governor to the Central Bank of Libya, with a temporary headquarters in Benghazi."

The Security Council adopted a resolution on March 17 that froze the foreign assets of the Libyan National Oil Corp. and the Central Bank of Libya, both described in the text as "a potential source of funding" for Qaddafi’s regime.

Libya holds Africa’s largest oil reserve. Output has fallen to fewer than 400,000 barrels a day, Shokri Ghanem, chairman of the National Oil Corp., said on March 19. The country produced 1.59 million barrels a day in January, according to estimates compiled by Bloomberg. Exports may be halted for "many months" because of sanctions and unrest, the International Energy Agency said. Read more here

U.S. Missiles Strike Libyan Air Defense Targets
The New York Times
By STEVEN ERLANGER and

DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK
March 19, 2011

PARIS — American and European forces began a broad campaign of strikes against the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi on Saturday, unleashing warplanes and missiles in the first round of the largest international military intervention in the Arab world since the invasion of Iraq, the Pentagon said.

Pentagon and NATO officials detailed a mission designed to impose a United Nations-sanctioned no-fly zone and keep Mr. Qaddafi from using airpower against beleaguered rebel forces in the east. While the overall effort was portrayed as mostly being led by France and Britain, the Pentagon said that American forces dominated an effort to knock out Libya’s air-defense systems.

In a briefing Saturday afternoon, Vice Adm. William Gortney told reporters that about 110 Tomahawk missiles, fired from American warships and submarines and one British submarine struck 20 air-defense targets around Tripoli, the capital, and the western city of Misurata. He said the strikes were against longer-range air defense missiles as well as early warning radar sites and main command-and-control communication centers. Read more here

Pan Am Flight 103
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pan Am Flight 103 was Pan American World Airways' third daily scheduled transatlantic flight from London Heathrow Airport to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport. On December 21, 1988 the aircraft flying this route - a Boeing 747-121 named Clipper Maid of the Seas - was destroyed by a bomb, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew members. Eleven people in Lockerbie, in southern Scotland, were also killed as large sections of the plane fell in the town and destroyed several houses, bringing total fatalities to 270. As a result, the news media has named the event the Lockerbie bombing.

On February 24, 2011 resigned Libyan justice minister Mustafa Abdul Jalil stated that Muammar Gaddafi personally ordered the Lockerbie bombing.

Gaddafi - still a murderer

On May 29, 2002 Libya offered up to US$2.7 billion to settle claims by the families of the 270 killed in the Lockerbie bombing, representing US$10 million per family. Jim Kreindler of New York law firm Kreindler & Kreindler orchestrated the settlement.

Compensation for the families of the PA103 victims was among the steps set by the UN for lifting its sanctions against Libya. On December 5, 2003 Jim Kreindler revealed that his law firm would receive an initial contingency fee of around US$1 million from each of the 128 American families Kreindler represents. The firm's fees could exceed US$300 million eventually. Read more on Wikipedia

Why Qaddafi Has Already Lost
By ALI ABDULLATIF AHMIDA
The New York Times
March 16, 2011

THE fight is not over. Whether or not Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi defeats the rebels in eastern Libya, any legitimacy he once had has been extinguished. He has weapons, tanks and planes, but he has lost the allegiance of even those elements of Libyan society that had once been willing to wait and hope for political reform. His base of support is now only diehard allies and foreign mercenaries. They might win on the battlefield, but they will lose in the end.

The uprisings in neighboring Tunisia and Egypt were precipitating events, but the resistance has drawn its core motivation from Libya’s brutal experience of colonialism. What is most striking about the rhetoric of the rebellion is how the anticolonialist theme that Colonel Qaddafi once deployed has now been turned against him and is being used on Twitter and Facebook. Even as they are assaulted by Colonel Qaddafi’s forces, the rebels have resisted calling for forceful Western intervention, though they support the imposition of a no-flight zone.

Libya’s history explains why. From 1911 to 1943, half a million Libyans died under Italian rule, including 60,000 in concentration camps run by the fascists. Colonel Qaddafi’s nationalist populism is rooted in the traumas of the colonial era, which were papered over during the modernizing but out-of-touch monarchy that ruled from 1951 to 1969. Read more here

Libyan rebels lose last stronghold west of Tripoli
By RYAN LUCAS and DIAA HADID
Associated Press

March 15, 2011

TOBRUK, Libya – Moammar Gadhafi's forces overwhelmed rebels in a strategic eastern city, hammering them with airstrikes, missiles, tanks and artillery Tuesday in an assault that sent residents fleeing and threatened to open the way for an all-out government offensive on the opposition's main stronghold in the east, Benghazi.

In desperation, rebels sent up two antiquated warplanes that struck a government ship bombarding Ajdabiya from the Mediterranean. But as tanks rolled into the city from two
directions and rockets relentlessly pounded houses and shops, the ragtag opposition fighters' defenses appeared to break down. Some lashed out at the West for failing to come to their aid with a no-fly zone.

"This is a mad man, a butcher," one rebel fighter said of Gadhafi, speaking to The Associated Press by telephone as explosions were heard in the background. "It's indiscriminate fire."

"The world is sleeping," he said. "They (the West) drunk of Gadhafi's oil and now they won't stand against him. They didn't give us a no-fly zone." Read more here

Libya's rebels try to organize better, but it's not easy
McClatchy Newspapers
By Nancy A. Youssef
March 12, 2011

AJDABIYA, Libya — As the conflict for control of Libya appears to be turning into a protracted war, the motley rebel forces that once charged forward easily to take parts of the east said Saturday that they now must organize themselves better militarily.

Here at the large green arches that mark this city's boundaries, where hundreds of rebel fighters once gathered jubilantly to march of to war, some not even carrying weapons, few remain. It's become too dangerous, the remaining rebels say. A few tanks remain, and only a few fighters patrol this entryway to the city.

Rebels said they now have commanders operating out of the newly named military operations center in Benghazi, the capital in the liberated east. Those commanders of the east's rebel Army join them at the front as well, fighters said, often wearing the rank of colonel on procured uniforms they didn't own a few days ago.

The rebels now even have food and water supply lines running from liberated towns to the ones up for control, sometimes with food prepared by wives left behind at home, so they now can stay and fight for days at a time.

The fighters also have developed their own rotation schedule so they can go home and rest. Many fighters have fought in every town won, moving along the barren highway that connects the cities. Indeed, they are starting to recognize each other and their doctors who travel with them between battlefields. Read more

Libyan Opposition Leaders Slam U.S. Business Lobby’s Deals With Gaddafi
Marcus Baram
Huffington Post
February 21, 2011

Some of the biggest oil producers and servicers, including BP, ExxonMobil, Halliburton, Chevron, Conoco and Marathon Oil joined with defense giants like Raytheon and Northrop Grumman, multinationals like Dow Chemical and Fluor and the high-powered law firm White & Case to form the US-Libya Business Association in 2005. The members of its executive advisory council each pay $20,000 in annual dues to the group, which is managed by the National Foreign Trade Council, a coalition that seeks to facilitate international opportunities for U.S. companies. Most of the group's members have lobbied the U.S. government since 2004 to protect their investments in Libya or to iron out business problems with the regime. Bilateral trade with Libya totaled $2.7 billion in 2010, compared to practically nothing in 2003 when sanctions were still in force. Read more here

2011 Egyptian revolution
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The 2011 Egyptian revolution took place following a popular uprising that began on 25 January 2011. The uprising, in which the participants placed emphasis on the peaceful nature of the struggle, mainly comprised a campaign of civil resistance, which featured a series of demonstrations, marches, acts of civil disobedience, and labor strikes. Millions of protesters from a variety of socioeconomic and religious backgrounds demanded the overthrow of the regime of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Despite being predominantly peaceful in nature, the revolution was not without violent clashes between security forces and protesters. The campaign took place in Cairo, Alexandria, and in other cities in Egypt, following the Tunisian Revolution that saw the overthrow of the long-time Tunisian president. On 11 February, following weeks of determined popular protest and pressure, Mubarak resigned from office. Read more here on Wikipedia

Hosni Mubarak

The Egyptian Labor Uprising Against Rubinites

Naked Capitalism

by Matt Stoller

February 14, 2011

By Matt Stoller, the former Senior Policy Advisor for Rep. Alan Grayson. His Twitter feed is @matthewstoller    

Via Wikileaks, we learned that the son of the former President of Egypt, Gamal Mubarak, had an interesting conversation in 2009 with Senator Joe Lieberman on the banking crisis. Gamal is a key figure in the forces buffeting Egypt, global forces of labor arbitrage, torture, and financial corruption. Gamal believed that the bailouts of the banks weren’t big enough – "you need to inject even more money into the system than you have". Gamal, a former investment banker trained at Bank of America, helped craft Egypt’s industrial policy earlier in the decade.

Gamal Mubarak

Our purpose is to improve Egyptians’ living standards. We have a three-pronged plan to achieve this: favoring Egypt’s insertion into the global economy, reducing the state’s role in the economy, and giving the private sector greater freedom.

Deregulation, globalization, and privatization. This should be a familiar American recipe, commonly associated with former Treasury Secretary and Goldman Sachs chief Bob Rubin. That Rubinite rhetoric has been adopted by the children of strongmen shows the influence of Davos, the global annual conference of power brokers. Gamal, far more polished than his father, understood that the profit and power for his family lay in cooperating with foreign investors to squeeze labor as hard as possible.

This strategy was targeted at the global labor arbitrage going on since the 1970s, with Egypt’s role as one cheap labor in-sourcer. It’s no surprise that the Mubarak family has $40-70B stashed away in the global tax safe havens coddling the superrich. This wealth was extracted from the youth and women in Egypt’s new factories making low-cost goods for export. This is why the revolution was spearheaded by youth and women, and why the nationalist business elite, with its deep ties to the military, sided with the protesters. Mubarak’s inner circle aligned themselves with international investors and set themselves against domestic business and military interests. Read more here

Tunisian Revolution
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Tunisian Revolution is an intensive campaign of civil resistance, including a series of street demonstrations taking place in Tunisia. The events began in December 2010 and led to the ousting of longtime President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali in January 2011. Street demonstrations and other unrest have continued to the present day.

The demonstrations were precipitated by high unemployment, food inflation, corruption, a lack of freedom of speech and other political freedom and poor living conditions. The protests constituted the most dramatic wave of social and political unrest in Tunisia in three decades and have resulted in scores of deaths and injuries, most of which were the result of action by police and security forces against demonstrators. The protests were sparked by the selfimmolation of Mohamed Bouazizi on 17 December and led to the ousting of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali 28 days later on 14 January 2011, when he officially resigned after fleeing to Saudi Arabia, ending 23 years in power. Labour unions were said to be an integral part of the protests. The protests inspired similar actions throughout the Arab world; the Egyptian revolution began after the events in Tunisia and also led to the ousting of Egypt's longtime president Hosni Mubarak; furthermore, protests have also taken place in Algeria, Yemen, Jordan, Bahrain, Iraq, Mauritania, and also Libya where a full-scale rebellion has broken out Pakistan and elsewhere in the wider North Africa and Middle East.

Read more here

Insight: In home of Arab Spring, a desire for more
Reuters
By Lin Noueihed
September 5, 2011

(Reuters) - In the offices of one of Tunisia's many political parties, a poster captures the fear that keeps people returning to the streets. It shows a woman in the midst of a protest. She holds up a simple sign: "The martyrs did not die for a new dictatorship."

Nine months after the revolt that swept away President Zine al-Abdine Ben Ali and sparked uprisings around the Arab world, Tunisians fear the changes they fought for may already be fading.

Most people in this country of 10 million are proud their revolution spread to the rest of the region, and keen to set an example with democratic elections in October. But many worry that Ben Ali loyalists continue to hold positions of power and are working behind the scenes to curtail real change. They are also concerned that divisions, particularly over the role of Islam, could destabilize Tunisia's transition to democracy and leave the economic problems that helped spark the uprising unresolved.

It's a similar story in Egypt, where the military council that took control after the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak has delayed elections in the Arab world's most populous country. Some Egyptians worry that they have swapped one dictatorship for another. Read more here