| |
Libya tries to come in from the
cold
By Ian Urbina
On Monday,
the Bush administration stated its plans to renew US
sanctions against Libya. Though not a surprise, the
announcement did come in stark contrast to the direction
that the rest of the world is heading in relation to
Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. Predictably, US petroleum
companies such as Conoco and Occidental were sorely
disappointed to be shut out for yet another year from
some of the world's largest reserves of light oil. But
the decision may also put strains on the US war on
terrorism, especially in the fight against the Abu
Sayyaf forces in the Philippines.
For
close to 30 years, Gaddafi has been a Western
pariah. After toppling the Libyan monarchy in 1969 at the age
of 27, the colonel quickly earned
international ire, appropriating US oil interests and
spouting pan-Arab rhetoric. In the late 1970s, he
distinguished himself as the region’s foremost sponsor
of terrorism, opening Tripoli for the likes of Abu Nidal
and Carlos the Jackal to set up shop.
In April
1986, after evidence that Gaddafi had a hand in a
terrorist attack in Berlin that killed an American GI,
the US bombed Libya's two largest cities, killing more
than 60 civilians. Two years later, Libya was suspected
in the downing of Pan Am flight 103 in Lockerbie
Scotland, which killed over 160 people. With UN backing,
comprehensive sanctions were imposed that same year,
including a freeze of Libyan assets and a ban on all
trade and financial dealings with Libya.
That
was then.
With the Lockerbie case presently
drawing to a close, Gaddafi seems to want to come in
from the cold, and the international community appears
to be open to the idea. Over the past year, France and
Britain have both dispatched foreign ministers to the
Libyan capital to discuss re-establishing trade and
diplomatic relations. Germany is jostling to get a chunk
of Libyan oil exports, 30 percent of which currently go
to Italy. The UN froze its sanctions on Libya in 1999
when Gaddafi handed over the Lockerbie suspects.
But aside from business interests, the US has
its eye on Libyan intelligence. The colonel possesses
three decades worth of information about the workings of
his former co-conspirators. He is said to possess
information on al-Qaeda cells throughout the Middle
East. Furthermore, as an elder statesman from the
region’s most radical organizations, Gaddafi is able -
not to mention seemingly willing - to serve as an
intermediary when the need arises for negotiations with
elements from the underworld.
However, Libya may
be having second thoughts. Just last week, Gaddafi’s
son, Seif el-Islam, who is possibly being prepped as the
country’s successor, gave a speech in Pakistan stating
that it was time for Libya to stop helping the US in the
war on terrorism. His reasons were simple: not only had
Libya received little in return from the US for prior
assistance, but with the lopsided nature of ongoing US
policies toward Israel and the Palestinians, and now
with US plans to invade Iraq, the cost for cooperating
with Washington was simply too high, and the benefits
too low.
This could represent a significant
setback in the path to rehabilitation which Gaddafi
began five years ago. During the early 1990s, the
colonel laid low and speculation abounded about whether
he had fully left his radical tendencies behind. While
some in the US still viewed him as a threat, others saw
him as a harmless and comical throwback - a sort of
Austin Powers of international politics. But by 1998,
Gaddafi began sending an obvious message that he wanted
to normalize his stand with the West. He expelled Abu
Nidal and his organization from Libyan territories. He
also began handing over intelligence to the British,
cashing in his years of arming the IRA. In that same
year, Gaddafi further distinguished himself by making
Libya the first nation to issue an Interpol arrest
warrant for Osama bin Laden, five months before the
attacks on the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania which
left 224 dead.
September 11 offered the clearest
indication that the Gaddafi’s days of fiery
anti-American rhetoric were a thing of the past. When
the planes hit the World Trade Towers, he could not have
been more unequivocal in choosing sides. Gaddafi was one
of the first world leaders to issue a statement strongly
condemning the attacks as horrific and gruesome, urging
Libyans to donate blood for the US victims. On September
16, he declared that the United States had justification
to retaliate for the attacks. In subsequent months, he
repeatedly denounced terrorism and Libyan agents
allegedly stepped up their delivery of reports about
al-Qaeda activities throughout the region.
Gaddafi also began attempting to put his clout
in the Islamic world to good use. In December 2001, he
volunteered to mediate the military standoff between
India and Pakistan. In October 2002, he urged the
Chechen rebels to release the hundreds of hostages they
were holding in a Moscow theater, saying their actions
ran counter to the "teachings of Islam".
But it
was in the Philippines that the rehabilitated colonel
really attempted to earn his diplomatic keep. Gaddafi
had particularly strong in-roads to the rebel groups
fighting in the Philippines because during the 1970s and
1980s he had helped found and sustain some of the
original Muslim independence movements there.
In
March of 2000, Abu Sayyaf - a latter-day and
significantly more thuggish splinter from these
movements - kidnapped 58 people from a Basilan school.
Later that year, the group drew international attention
with the abduction of 21 hostages, including 10 foreign
tourists, from a Malaysian diving resort. When the
Philippine government showed its impotence in dealing
with the crisis, other governments whose nationals were
involved got desperate. They asked Libya for help.
Before stepping in, Gaddafi secured an endorsement from
France, Germany, Finland and South Africa to assist in
ending Tripoli’s international isolation. In return, he
would attempt to secure the release of their nationals.
The deal was struck, and Libya intervened, eventually
putting up $20 million in ransom. The hostages were
freed.
The US remained unimpressed, contending
that the ransom only ended up attracting thousands of
new Abu Sayyaf supporters and financing the purchase of
new arms and equipment. Most other countries were
thankful for the Libyan intervention.
In May
2001, Abu Sayyaf struck again, kidnapping 20 hostages
from the Dos Palmas resort on the island of Palawan.
Current Philippines president Gloria Macapagal Arroyo
has refused to negotiate with the Abu Sayyaf, instead
ordering - with significant US help - an all-out
military campaign against the rebel group. One of the
American hostages, Guillermo Sobero, was murdered by the
group last year.
It is not the case that the US
is unaware of the utility of Libyan leverage and
intelligence. Just last year the London-based newspaper
Al-Zaman reported that Musa Kusa, chief of the Libyan
intelligence service, was holding extensive meetings in
London with senior British and US security officials to
discuss continued cooperation from Libya in the war on
terrorism. In these discussions, one of the main topics
of concern was the Philippines. According to the source,
"Tripoli's role in the release of Western hostages in
the Philippines has given it a complete picture of the
Abu Sayyaf group's activities, which is one of the
principal files that Washington needs at present."
Additionally, the Libyans were said to have provided
"very important information about sleeping cells of
terrorist organizations in Africa and inside European
territories".
But the temporary thaw in
relations which made this sort of cooperation possible
may not last. So far, Washington does not want to change
its firm stance. Part of the reason is that the US is
far better at inflicting diplomatic punishments such as
embargoes, than it is at reversing them. Over time, such
policies get mixed with domestic politics and no
administration wants to seem soft on rogue states,
whether these states are reformed or otherwise. The UN
sanctions originally worked because they were
multilateral. Now that the sanctions are unilateral,
they are more likely to box in Washington - both
military and economically - than anyone else.
Libya still has a way to go in cleaning up its
record. Domestically, political repression is
widespread. There are no independent human rights
organizations or nongovernmental organizations of any
kind, and the government strictly controls the press.
There are hundreds of political prisoners, and torture
in detention is common. On the international front,
Libya has signed all 12 international conventions on
terrorism, but it still needs to sign, and more
importantly stick to, the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Gaddafi’s recent purchase of missile-delivery systems
has not helped in instilling confidence that he is now a
man of diplomacy not force.
The Lockerbie case
is also not yet fully closed. Two key US conditions are
still pending: payment to the victims' families and
Gaddafi’s public acceptance of guilt. And even if these
requirement are met, it’s not clear that the US will
budge.
Meanwhile, the US business and
intelligence communities will go on wringing their hands
in frustrated anticipation.
(©2003 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com
for information on our sales and syndication policies,
or to submit a letter to the editor.)
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
