Middle East and North Africa Unrest

This should have been done months ago, it is quite shameful to think that we have been paying money to that murdering prick all this time. The reality is that Syria can easily sell the oil to someone else, just as the EU can buy the stuff elsewhere, but it is a statement of disapproval which is way late.

:mad:

On top of that Italy made sure this won't take effect until mid-November.
 
On top of that Italy made sure this won't take effect until mid-November.

Berlusconi, "one hand washes the other", Don Silvio.

Or surprise me and tell me the good reason for the extension to November.

:rolleyes:

* * *

BBC News - Gaddafi regime's US-UK spy links revealed

BBC News said:
US and UK spy agencies built close ties with their Libyan counterparts during the so-called War on Terror, according to documents discovered at the office of Col Gaddafi's former spy chief.

The papers suggest the CIA abducted several suspected militants from 2002 to 2004 and handed them to Tripoli.

The UK's MI6 also apparently gave the Gaddafi regime details of dissidents.

The documents, found by Human Rights Watch workers, have not been seen by the BBC or independently verified.

..

The papers outline the rendition of several suspects, including one that Human Rights Watch has identified as Abdel Hakim Belhaj, known in the documents as Abdullah al-Sadiq, who is now the military commander of the anti-Gaddafi forces in Tripoli.

more via link

Ooops!

The sins of the past now embarrassing the current government administrations of both the US & UK.

Foreign Secretary Hague stated that the documents refer to incidents under the previous administration and that he could not comment anyway because it was "an intelligence matter".

The practice of "rendition flights", now well known, was a pretty dubious activity which is now long having long term, unforeseen political implications. A really poor example of good, legal and moral actions, from the leaders of two democracies.

Ditto Tony Blair chuming up to Gaddafi.

* * *

BBC News - UN envoy arrives to discuss Libya future

BBC News said:
A special envoy for the UN secretary general has arrived in Libya's capital to try to boost international efforts in the country's redevelopment.

Ian Martin arrived in Tripoli to discuss how the UN can help the interim National Transitional Council (NTC).

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Damn, the UN bloke has beaten the NTC interim administration to Tripoli. The NTC have a Security detail there, but not much else, yet.

There are probably lots of good reasons why the NTC aren't in Tripoli yet, but it is not a time to be tardy about getting a grip of the many problems.

It seems to be all peaceful at the present, but the people there need electricity, water, gas and food, etc.
Maybe the UN bloke will do it all.
 
Well, a quiet political stalemate has been in force for a few days while negotiators try and seek a surrender or armistice of the hold out towns. (Sirte, Bani Walid etc.)

Then this:
BBC News - Rockets fired from Bani Walid

BBC News said:
Forces loyal to Col Muammar Gaddafi have fired rockets from Bani Walid, one of the last strongholds of the fugitive Libyan leader.

Rockets landed near those surrounding the town ahead of a Saturday deadline for loyalists to surrender.

Earlier, Col Gaddafi gave a defiant message dismissing speculation that he had fled to Niger.

The central bank, meanwhile, said 1.7bn Libyan dinars ($1.4bn; ?875m) worth of gold had been sold during the conflict.

Col Gaddafi's whereabouts remain the subject of speculation - though both the National Transitional Council (NTC) and Western officials have said they have no reason to believe he has left Libya.

The NTC has been trying to negotiate a peaceful resolution to stand-offs in a handful of Libyan towns or cities still controlled by Gaddafi loyalists.

These include Bani Walid, Jufra, Sabha and Col Gaddafi's birthplace of Sirte.


Reminds me of Saddam firing off random rockets. Looks bloody silly, as I believe they hit a load of sand, of which there is much in Libya.


Taint? Did they mean his famous Tent?

No understandee. :?
 
 
:lmao:

Reminds me of Saddam firing off random rockets. Looks bloody silly, as I believe they hit a load of sand, of which there is much in Libya.
They're pretty useless and (relatively) pathetic looking when you just light one or two off at a time. That made me think of a good Wired article, sort of a short history of Gaddafi's SCUD program. Linked in there is a Slate article about why middle-eastern strongmen love SCUDs so much. They're cheap, but they can terrorize the hell out of your neighbors if you fire off a bunch of them. Obviously Gaddafi's remaining forces don't have that capability, though there are still eighty to a few hundred SCUD's in the country. Somewhere.
 
Protest of Thousands in Cairo Turns Violent
By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and HEBA AFIFY
Published: September 9, 2011

CAIRO ? A demonstration that brought tens of thousands to this city?s central Tahrir Square turned violent on Friday, when thousands of people ? led by a heavy contingent of soccer fans ? tore down a protective wall around the Israeli Embassy, while others defaced the headquarters of the Egyptian Interior Ministry.

The Egyptian state news agency said 448 people were injured and 17 protesters were arrested in the clashes, mostly around the Israeli embassy. Protesters scaled the walls of the Israeli Embassy to tear down its flag, broke into offices and tossed binders of documents into the streets.

Mustafa el Sayed, 28, said he had been among about 20 protesters who broke into the embassy. He showed a reporter video from a cellphone, of protesters rummaging through papers and ransacking an office, and he said they had briefly beaten up an Israeli employee they found inside, before Egyptian soldiers stopped them. The soldiers removed the protesters from the building, he said, but let them go free.

By 11:30 p.m., about 50 trucks had arrived with Egyptian riot police officers, who filled the surrounding streets with tear gas. Witnesses said that protesters had set a kiosk on fire in front of a security building near the embassy, and that the police had fired rubber bullets to disperse the crowd from both buildings. But at 3 a.m. Saturday, thousands of protesters were still battling thousands of riot police officers. Demonstrators threw rocks and gasoline bombs at the officers, sometimes forcing them to retreat, and the police fired back with tear gas. To celebrate an advance, protesters set off the flares that they typically use to cheer at soccer matches.

Egyptian airport officials said early Saturday that the Israeli ambassador was waiting for a military plane to leave the country, The Associated Press reported.

United States officials said Defense Minister Ehud Barak of Israel had called Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, who in turn asked the Egyptian military to try to restore order at the embassy.

In addition, a fire broke out in the basement of the Interior Ministry, but it appeared to have been started from the inside and not by the protesters surrounding the building. The fire was in a room believed to store criminal records.

The scale of the protests and the damage inflicted represented a departure from the previously peaceful character of the demonstrations staged periodically in Tahrir Square since the revolution in January and February.

Organizers of Friday?s demonstrations had said they would call for a list of familiar liberal goals, like retribution against former President Hosni Mubarak and an end to military trials of civilians. But thousands of people marched off from the square to express their anger over disparate recent events, including a recent dispute along the border with Israel and a brawl between soccer fans and the police at a match on Tuesday.

Thousands of hard-core soccer fans ? known here as ultras ? were for the first time a conspicuous presence in the protests and a dominant force in the violence. They led the attacks on the Interior Ministry and the security building near the Israeli Embassy, and they kept up the fight outside the embassy long after others had gone home. At the Interior Ministry, political activists tried to form human barriers to protect the building, urging protesters to retreat to the square and chanting, ?Peacefully, peacefully.?

?Those who love Egypt should not destroy it!? they chanted.

The embassy, which has been the site of several previous demonstrations after the Israeli armed forces accidentally killed at least three Egyptian officers while chasing Palestinian militants near the border last month, was an early target on Friday. In response to almost daily protests since the shootings, the Egyptian authorities had built a concrete wall surrounding the embassy, and by early afternoon thousands of protesters, some equipped with hammers, were marching toward the building to try to tear down the wall.

After using the hammers and broken poles to break through sections of the wall, protesters began using ropes attached to cars to pull away sections. By the end of the night, the wall was virtually demolished.

Egyptian military and security police officers largely stood by without interfering with the demolition. Instead, they clustered at the entrance to the embassy to keep protesters out. The security forces had pulled back from Tahrir Square and other areas before the start of the day to avoid clashes with the protesters, although the military had issued a stern warning on its Facebook page against property destruction.

Egyptians outside the embassy seized on the wall as a symbol. ?We were attacked inside our own land,? said Ahmed Abdel Mohsen, 26, a government employee. ?They can?t lock us out in a wall in our own country. Nothing will stand in the way of Egyptians again.?

The soccer fans turned out in response to a melee with the police after a match on Tuesday. Long known for their obscene chants and reckless brawls, the ultras have become increasingly engaged in politics since the revolution.

The soccer match took place against the backdrop of the trial of Mr. Mubarak and his interior minister, Habib el-Adly, who are accusing of conspiring to kill protesters. The ultras chanted obscene songs denouncing both men and their security forces, and at the end of the match, witnesses said, the security police attacked the ultras, leaving more than 100 people injured and more than 20 fans in jail.

By Friday night, a few hundred protesters had managed to pull down 9 of the 13 letters in the Arabic signs on the wall of the Interior Ministry. And graffiti on the wall went far beyond the soccer brawl to attack the military council running the country in the name of the revolution and its leader, Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi.

?Down with the traitorous council!? some of the graffiti read. ?Down with the Field Marshal.?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/10/world/middleeast/10egypt.html

Unfortunate. Mubarak knew that in order to retain the aid he was receiving from the United States he had to work with Israel and keep a lid on extremists.
 
BBC News - Libya conflict: Gaddafi forces resist Bani Walid attack

BBC News said:
Pro-Gaddafi forces in Libya have been putting up fierce resistance in Bani Walid, one of four towns still controlled by loyalist fighters.

Anti-Gaddafi forces, who had expected to take the town earlier, have still to reach the centre.

There was fighting overnight, with exchanges of fire and rockets launched.

Latest reports say Nato has carried out air strikes on the town. A Reuters reporter heard at least five explosions and saw Nato aircraft overhead.

Earlier, anti-Gaddafi fighters pulled back from Bani Walid, saying they expected Nato air raids.


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It looks like the "End Game", some of Gadaffi's people have decamped, but a number still remain in the four holdout towns & cities. Leads me to suspect the Gadaffi and crew are stil in one or more of them, otherwise I suspect the armistice or surrender negotiations, would have been more fruitfull.

Unfortunate. Mubarak knew that in order to retain the aid he was receiving from the United States he had to work with Israel and keep a lid on extremists.

Yes, unfortunate. The new Egypt will have to make a new diplomatic arrangement with Israel. The Egyptian protesters are now used to getting their voice heard and are not in the mood for putting up with crap from anyone anymore. The border incident ended with the death of several Egyptian border police. Rioting outside the Israeli Embassy is not a very mature way to show their grievances, but an understandable one in a "new country" with a new politcal landscape.
 
Unfortunate. Mubarak knew that in order to retain the aid he was receiving from the United States he had to work with Israel and keep a lid on extremists.

Regardless of how Mubarak played in to this, tearing down an embassy wall and raiding it is totally out of line.
 
BBC News - Libyan NTC fighters breach Gaddafi city Sirte from east

BBC News said:
Anti-Gaddafi fighters have breached the former Libya leader's hometown of Sirte from the east for the first time, as their three-day long assault continues.

Soldiers traded rocket fire with Gaddafi loyalists as they edged from the eastern suburbs into the city.

The advance comes two days after the soldiers, loyal to the National Transitional Council, attacked from the west before retreating again.

Sirte is one of the last remaining strongholds of Gaddafi loyalists.

more via link

After a week or so of negotiation, then some regrouping by NTC forces, the end game continues into the last days, I hope. If the NTC are confident they can win without significant losses to themselves or to civilians, then the mainly military approach would seem appropriate. If the NTC are not so sure, a more politically savvy approach ought be taken and the NTC should "allow" an escape route for the low level Gaddafi fighters to leave the four or so remaining reboubts. No one needs or wants a blood bath, with cities and towns smashed up for no good reason.
 
Colonel Gaddafi reported dead today by the NTC officials:
20 October 2011 Last updated at 13:23 GMT

Libya's Col Muammar Gaddafi killed, say NTC officials

Breaking news

Libya's former leader Col Muammar Gaddafi has been killed after an assault on his home town of Sirte, officials from the transitional authorities have said.

Information Minister Mahmoud Shammam said fighters on the ground had told him they had seen Col Gaddafi's body.

Other officials also said he was killed during the assault on Sirte.

The claims have not yet been independently verified, and other reports said he was captured alive.

The colonel was toppled in August after 42 years in power. The International Criminal Court has been seeking his arrest.

Nato, which has been running a bombing campaign in Libya for months, said it carried out an air strike earlier on Thursday that hit two pro-Gaddafi vehicles near Sirte.

It was unclear whether the strikes were connected with the reports of Col Gaddafi's death.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15389550
 
Good. Now lets get on and deal with Kim Jong Il and Robert Mugabe.

Except noone will since they don't have any oil.
 
Yes, but they get stuck in my fuel line! :p
 
But Zimbabwe have lots of fertile soil! The Kim's, not so much.
 
Good. Now lets get on and deal with Kim Jong Il and Robert Mugabe.

Except noone will since they don't have any oil.

Nah Iran is next. Look at the bullshit assassination plot that has been alleged. Iran won't be a push over however. You won't get a lot of U.S. sympathy from a nation that has already suffered from U.S. good intentions.
 

I've been waiting for an excuse to post that...
 
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