Why has Africa’s response to the Libyan regime’s shooting of protesters – and hiring of African mercenaries to actually pull the triggers – been so weak? So far, the continent’s reaction amounts to this: the African Union has condemned “the disproportionate use of force against civilians,” which pretty much implies that cracking down on …
Gaddafi
Libya, China and the Myth of ‘No-Strings’ Investment
Beijing is scrambling to get tens of thousands of people out of Libya after a wave of attacks on Chinese oilfields, construction sites and work camps. As the state-run China Daily reported prominently this morning, about 12,000 Chinese nationals were evacuated by charter plane, ocean liner and bus. State media area playing up the …
Winds of Libyan Change Envelop British Government in Stench
Tony Blair’s 2004 meeting with Muammar Gaddafi was momentous by any standards. Blair’s arrival in Libya marked the first visit to the country by a British prime minister since 1943, and proceeded against protests by some relatives of the Lockerbie dead. His purpose was to encourage Gaddafi’s perceived desire “to make common cause with us …
From Recruitment Camps in the Sahara, Libya’s Mercenaries Emerge
Very early on in the course of the uprising in Libya, an iconic image appeared: that of spent ammunition casings. This has been a revolution of chaos and attrition, with anti-government protesters pitted against a repressive and volatile state, one, which at times has seemed on the brink of collapse and, in other moments, appeared steely …
That Venezuela Rumor: Why Gaddafi Could Flee to Chavez
The big rumor wafting out of the bloody unrest in Libya over the weekend – that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi had taken refuge in Venezuela – had become so widespread that when Gaddafi appeared on state television on Tuesday, one of his first messages was: “I am here in Tripoli and not in Venezuela.”
The global media had been …