country:libya

Gaddafi is stronger than ever in Libya | Richard Seymour | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jul/29/gaddafi-libya-nato

It’s important to bear in mind what this means. Both Ben Ali and Mubarak had the support of the US and its major allies – especially Mubarak. They had considerable resources for repression, and there was financial aid being channelled to them, talks aimed at offering reforms to the opposition … and in the end they proved too brittle, too narrowly based, to stay in power.

The state apparatus began to fragment and decompose. The protests kept spreading, and withstood the bloodshed. Nothing they could offer or threaten was sufficient. Gaddafi, on the other hand, has hung on in the face of not only a lack of support from his former imperialist allies, but active political, diplomatic and military opposition. That he did so to a considerable extent through sheer military superiority doesn’t mean that the regime hasn’t a real social basis.

Libya Rebels Get Formal Backing, and $30 Billion - NYTimes.com
►http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/16/world/africa/16libya.html

The United States formally recognized the rebel leadership in Libya as the country’s legitimate government on Friday, allowing the rebel government access to $30 billion in Libyan assets held in the United States. It is not yet clear how and when the money would be released.

Alors évidemment, le New York Times tente toujours de te faire croire que les « officiels américains », qui viennent de décider de transférer 30 milliards de dollars à leurs nouveaux alliés, en fait, sont des philanthropes aussi naïfs que Oui-Oui au pays du pétrole. Ils aimeraient bien que leurs gentils copains ils développent des services publics, l’approvisionnement en électricité et les services de santé (autant de choses que, par ailleurs, l’administration américaine s’interdit rigoureusement de faire chez elle) ; mais il est à craindre que les 30 milliards passent dans l’achat de F-16, de tanks Abrams et de fusils M16. Et ça, on s’en doute, ça chagrinerait carrément les officiels américains.

Ce que ce magnifique paragraphe résume ainsi :

Although American officials expressed hope that the newly recognized Transitional National Council would use the money for traditional public services — to pay for health care and electrical power, for example — one of the council’s immediate priorities is arming and training its fighters so they can finally defeat the forces loyal to Colonel Qaddafi.

Libya’s neighborhoods prepare for NATO boots
►http://www.voltairenet.org/Libya-s-neighborhoods-prepare-for

Journalism as a Weapon of War in Libya
►http://www.voltairenet.org/Journalism-as-a-Weapon-of-War-in

As part of the international team of journalists on a fact-finding mission in Tripoli that Thierry Meyssan has already reported on, Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya shares his observations about the dishonest coverage taking place on the spot and the war which continues to be waged by Western media against Muammar Gaddafi in pursuit of an agenda and at the expense of the truth.

Amnesty questions claim that Gaddafi ordered rape as weapon of war - Africa, World - The Independent
►http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/africa/amnesty-questions-claim-that-gaddafi-ordered-rape-as-weapon-of-war-23

Human rights organisations have cast doubt on claims of mass rape and other abuses perpetrated by forces loyal to Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, which have been widely used to justify Nato’s war in Libya.

Nato leaders, opposition groups and the media have produced a stream of stories since the start of the insurrection on 15 February, claiming the Gaddafi regime has ordered mass rapes, used foreign mercenaries and employed helicopters against civilian protesters.

An investigation by Amnesty International has failed to find evidence for these human rights violations and in many cases has discredited or cast doubt on them. It also found indications that on several occasions the rebels in Benghazi appeared to have knowingly made false claims or manufactured evidence.

Voilà qui devrait intéresser ceux qui pensaient que cette guerre-là, au moins, avait peut-être de bonnes raisons d’être menée.

NATO admits civilian deaths in Libya raid - Africa - Al Jazeera English
►http://english.aljazeera.net/video/africa/2011/06/201161920139227219.html

“However, it appears that one weapon did not strike the intended target and that there may have been a weapons system failure which may have caused a number of civilian casualties.”

Le mot qui tue, aujourd’hui, c’est « weapons system failure ». Non mais regardez-moi ce chef-d’œuvre de novlangue de bidasse.

Immigration (The Big Picture)
►http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2011/06/immigration.html

Their homelands are torn by war, economic distress, political strife, or environmental collapse. They choose to leave, or have no choice. They’re called migrants, refugees, or internally displaced people. The labels are inadequate as often circumstances could allow all three descriptions, or some combination of them. Once in their new countries, they face difficult transitions, discrimination, or outright hostility. Host countries are burdened with the economic and political repercussions of the arrivals, while home nations are sometimes saddled with a “brain drain” of their most important human resources. Immigration is a hot-button issue in the American presidential race, and a wave of new arrivals from Libya to Italy has left the European Union struggling with decisions over the Schengen policy of borderless travel between member nations. Gathered here are images of some of the estimated 214 million people worldwide in the process of redefining what “home” means to them.

http://rezo.net/local/cache-vignettes/L120xH91/arton186558-f7369.jpg

Et voilà : nos mercenaires en Libye.

La principale innovation des occidentaux pour contourner les limites de la guerre conventionnelle, depuis une vingtaine d’années, consiste à faire faire leur guerre par des mercenaires (pour lesquelles on trouvera autant de néologismes élégants que nécessaire). Plusieurs articles suggèrent désormais que les occidentaux, à nouveau, lâchent leurs chiens de guerre ; cette fois en Libye. On peut le tourner comme on veut : les mercenaires n’ont jamais amené rien de bon à aucun pays.

À noter que, dans le cas libyen, le recours aux mercenaires permet instantanément de dépasser les limites du mandat de l’ONU : officiellement, on a un mandat limité ; officieusement, personne ne sait qui paie des mercenaires qui interviennent au sol et participent aux opérations offensives.

Mercenaries joining both sides in Libya conflict | News by Country | Reuters
►http://af.reuters.com/article/libyaNews/idAFN0229488620110602

The Guardian said contractors were helping NATO identify possible targets in the heavily contested city and passing this information, as well as information about the movements of Gaddafi’s forces, to a NATO command center in Naples, Italy. The newspaper reported that a group of six armed Westerners had been filmed by the Al Jazeera TV network talking to rebels in Misrata; the men fled after realizing they were being filmed.

U.S. officials have said the governments of Qatar and Saudi Arabia, which oppose Gaddafi, are willing to back his opponents with money and weapons.

One U.S. official said there are indications that Qatar may be paying outsiders to help the Libyan rebels. Qatar’s embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.

[...]

The official played down the involvement of mercenaries with Gaddafi’s opponents, saying, “So far, we haven’t seen discernible foreign mercenary support on the rebel side.”

À nouveau, l’« axe » Qatar-Arabie séoudite.

Admirons le titre de l’article d’Al Arabiya, grotesque, qui permettrait tout aussi bien de justifier le recours à la torture ou au massacre des civils.

Learning from Qaddafi, opposition hires mercenaries while Libyan turns to crooks
►http://www.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/06/01/151367.html

Former members of the Special Air Service (SAS) are among those gathering information about the location and movement of troops loyal to Colonel Qaddafi, British military sources told the paper.

They are passing that information on to NATO’s command center in Naples.

The former soldiers are in Libya with the blessing of Britain, France and other NATO countries, the sources told The Guardian.

La principale source de ces articles est l’article du Guardian :

Libya : SAS veterans helping Nato identify Gaddafi targets in Misrata | World news | The Guardian
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/31/libya-sas-veterans-misrata-rebels

These private soldiers are reported to be paid by Arab countries, notably Qatar. British officials said they were not being paid by the UK government.

Those countries in favour of the decision to impose a no-fly zone, and hostile to Gaddafi, would be strongly opposed to any direct – or official – link between western advisers and Nato commanders. The advisers are being kept at arm’s length, but their role is privately welcomed.

Russia Warns U.S., NATO Not to Aid Syrian Protesters After Libya - Businessweek
►http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-06-01/russia-warns-u-s-nato-not-to-aid-syrian-protesters-after-libya.html

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned the U.S. and European nations not to encourage anti-government protesters in Syria by holding out the prospect of military support like they provided in Libya.

“It is not in the interests of anyone to send messages to the opposition in Syria or elsewhere that if you reject all reasonable offers we will come and help you as we did in Libya,” Lavrov, 61, said yesterday during an interview in Moscow. “It’s a very dangerous position.”

#Syrie

Saudi Arabia Scrambles to Limit Region’s Upheaval - NYTimes.com
►http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/28/world/middleeast/28saudi.html

There are also suspicions that the kingdom is secretly providing money to extremist groups to hold back changes. Saudi officials deny that, although they concede private money may flow.

In 1952, after toppling the Egyptian king, Gamal Abdel Nasser worked to destabilize all monarchs, inspiring a regicide in Iraq and eventually the overthrow of King Idris of Libya. Saudi Arabia was locked in confrontation with Egypt throughout the 1960s, and it is determined not to relive that period.

“We are back to the 1950s and early 1960s, when the Saudis led the opposition to the revolutions at that time, the revolutions of Arabism,” said Mohammad F. al-Qahtani, a political activist in Riyadh.

►http://vanshardware.com/2011/05/the-case-of-the-missing-8-4-libyan-earthquake
The case of the missing 8.4 Libyan earthquake

“
Two different European earthquake monitoring sites (here and here) reported an 8.4 earthquake deep inside the Libyan desert about 30 miles southeast of Sinawin on May 19. The epicenter was approximately 120 miles south of the Mediterranean coast and roughly 200 miles southwest of Tripoli. Here are the earthquake details:
Oddly, this earthquake does not appear on the USGS website or any other earthquake reporting site.

Interestingly, the largest nuclear device ever detonated, the 50 megaton Soviet-made Tsar Bomba, would have been capable of producing almost exactly an 8.4 earthquake on the Richter Scale if it had been detonated deep underground.

Is this earthquake being censored? If so, was it a subterranean detonation in a remote desert location to safely demonstrate Libya’s nuclear capabilities to its Western attackers? The West would certainly want to contain that information to prevent widespread panic since a 50 megaton nuke could utterly wipe out an entire metropolis. Was the earthquake the result of a NATO attack? Or was the earthquake a real, natural event or simply a strange glitch on a pair of seismic instruments?”

Si, à cinquante ans, tu n’est pas cité dans un article du Guardian consacré aux « french intellectuals », c’est que tu as raté ta vie.

►http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/apr/26/french-intellectuals-feud-libya-campaign

Bernard-Henri Lévy, the celebrity philosopher who played a crucial role in Sarkozy’s decision to recognise the rebel movement and intervene in Libya, is under attack by another leading intellectual, the writer and film-maker Claude Lanzmann.
[...]

Despite being dismissed by one Élysée adviser as a “pretentious little bastard”, BHL’s influence over the president was unprecedented for a philosopher.

[...]

The pacifist philosopher Michel Onfray attacked BHL for personal “opportunism”, comparing him to a long line of French philosophers from Sartre to André Malraux who were “better at writing their own myth than the history of the world”.

The philosopher Regis Debray warned that French intellectuals became “comic” when they tried to interfere in foreign affairs. But the writer Renaud Camus defended BHL as part of the “best tradition of French intellectuals”, and the philosopher Pascal Bruckner said Lévy was “profoundly respectable” in staying true to his convictions.

Hein de Haas: Europe’s tiny #refugee burden: Putting the Libyan #migration crisis into perspective
►http://heindehaas.blogspot.com/2011/04/europes-tiny-refugee-burden-putting.html?spref=tw

How dare European politicians insinuate that these people will massively “invade” Europe?

Just some basic facts:

So far, only about 2,800 out of a total of 500,000 people fleeing the violence in #Libya have arrived in #Europe. This is less than 0.6 percent of all cross-border movements.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-CmfnCq-JVnc/TaYktaVP0-I/AAAAAAAAAEM/D_NncPiRWUM/s400/cross+border+movements+from+Libya.png

(via @isskein)

David Cameron’s gift of war and racism, to them and us (John Pilger)
►http://www.johnpilger.com/articles/david-cameron-s-gift-of-war-and-racism-to-them-and-us

The Euro-American attack on Libya has nothing to do with protecting anyone; only the terminally naive believe such nonsense. It is the West’s response to popular uprisings in strategic, resource-rich regions of the world and the beginning of a war of attrition against the new imperial rival, China.
President Barack Obama’s historical distinction is now guaranteed. He is America’s first black president to invade Africa. His assault on Libya is run by the US Africa Command, which was set up in 2007 to secure the continent’s lucrative natural resources from Africa’s impoverished people and the rapidly spreading commercial influence of China. (...)

The Larger Game in the Middle East - Iran - NYTimes.com
►http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/weekinreview/03sanger.html?_r=1

That afternoon in the Situation Room vividly demonstrates a rarely stated fact about the administration’s responses to the uprisings sweeping the region: The Obama team holds no illusions about Colonel Qaddafi’s long-term importance. Libya is a sideshow. Containing Iran’s power remains their central goal in the Middle East. Every decision — from Libya to Yemen to Bahrain to Syria — is being examined under the prism of how it will affect what was, until mid-January, the dominating calculus in the Obama administration’s regional strategy: how to slow Iran’s nuclear progress, and speed the arrival of opportunities for a successful uprising there.

Article important, même en le lisant avec la méfiance qu’il faut appliquer à ce genre d’article dans le New York Times. #Libye

Clandestine C.I.A. Operatives Gather Information in Libya - NYTimes.com
►http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/31/world/africa/31intel.html?_r=1

While President Obama has insisted that no American military ground troops participate in the Libyan campaign, small groups of C.I.A. operatives have been working in Libya for several weeks as part of a shadow force of Westerners that the Obama administration hopes can help bleed Colonel Qaddafi’s military, the officials said.

[...]

Several weeks ago, President Obama signed a secret finding authorizing the C.I.A. to provide arms and other support to Libyan rebels, American officials said Wednesday. But weapons have not yet been shipped into Libya, as Obama administration officials debate the effects of giving them to the rebel groups. The presidential finding was first reported by Reuters.

Bravo la précision : « several weeks », ça n’a rigoureusement aucun sens dans le cas présent. Les combats ont commencé mi-février (il y a six semaines) ; la résolution de l’ONU, c’est le 17 mars (il a deux semaines). #Libye

Intelligence on Libya rebels shows "flickers" of Qaeda - Yahoo ! News
►http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110329/pl_nm/us_libya_usa_intelligence

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Intelligence on the rebel forces battling Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has shown “flickers” of al Qaeda or Hezbollah presence, but there is still no detailed picture of the emerging Libyan opposition, NATO’s top operations commander said on Tuesday.

Non mais sérieusement... On les trouve où, les débiles de l’OTAN ?

Le conseil national libyen annonce le programme // A vision of a democratic Libya | The interim national council | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk
►http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/mar/29/vision-democratic-libya-interim-national-council

we will outline our aspirations for a modern, free and united state, following the defeat of the illegal Gaddafi regime. The interim national council will be guided by the following in our continuing march to freedom, through espousing the principles of political democrac

#libye

Article en anglais de Gilbert Achcar sur l’intervention en Libye. Ça m’impressionne toujours les gens qui parviennent à conserver les idées claires..

ZCommunications | Libya : a legitimate and necessary debate from an anti-imperialist perspective by Gilbert Achcar | ZNet Article
►http://www.zcommunications.org/libya-a-legitimate-and-necessary-debate-from-an-anti-imperialist-pe

Reference to the Rwandan case is given here only to show that there is room for discussion of concrete cases, even though one adheres to firm anti-imperialist principles. The argument that Western intervention in Libya is bound to make civilian victims (I’d actually care even for Gaddafi’s soldiers from a humanitarian perspective) is not determinative. What is decisive is the comparison between the human cost of this intervention and the cost that would have been incurred had it not happened.

#libye

No to intervention in Libya! Victory to Arab revolutions!|19Mar11|Socialist Worker
►http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=24253

Intervention could lead to the partition of Libya and the creation of a NATO-backed enclave. It will be an outpost of imperialism and could be used to halt further developments of the revolutionary process in Egypt and elsewhere.

#libye

Democracy Digest » Questioning the Facebook fixation: media is not the message
►http://www.demdigest.net/blog/2011/03/questioning-the-facebook-fixation-media-is-not-the-message

énième article sur #facebook et #révolution #Egypte

“Facebook and Twitter did not invent courage,” said Mona Eltahawy, an Egyptian journalist and blogger:

I think we owe it to these incredibly courageous people. Look how many people are being slaughtered in Libya, to recognize that this courage has been there for decades,… Facebook allowed you to see it,…allowed them to connect. But at the end of the day, it’s their courage to go out on the street and topple those regimes that must be saluted.

In Lebanon, Hezbollah is watching, and waiting out, the Arab uprisings
►http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/27/AR2011022703551.html

Hezbollah appears to realize that the revolt sweeping the Middle East has subtly changed the game for them. Officials see the Arab world moving into a more democratic and pluralistic politics with the fall of regimes in Tunisia, Egypt and perhaps Libya. In this new environment, Hezbollah doesn’t want to be seen as a sectarian militia or a wrecker, but as a democratic partner (albeit a potent one that has thousands of missiles pointed at Israel). Because Tunisia, Egypt and Libya are Sunni countries, recent events can be seen in part as a Sunni political resurgence, which Hezbollah must respect.

David Ignatius, qui vit sur une autre planète, aimerait bien rassurer ses lecteurs du Wapo. Il oublie juste que les grandes tirades anti-Hezbollah et les cochonneries sur le « triangle chiite » étaient le fait des dictateurs pro-américains, et non des populations « sunnites », chez qui Hassan Nasrallah est un personnage extrêmement populaire (si ce n’est le plus populaire du monde arabe).

arms trade « MAHB Sustainability Initiative
►http://mahbsustainability.wordpress.com/2011/03/03/arms-trade

Sergei Chemezov, the head of state industrial holding for Russian Technologies, says that Russia is to lose $4 billion in arms exports to Libya due to the imposition of UN sanctions against Gaddafi’s regime
via blogs.aljazeera.net
one of the great resistors to sustainable peaceful world. The US is too involved and too given to arms as jobs.

#armes #weapons #commerce

Libya — ’yet one more battleground between the U.S. and China’
►http://www.ufppc.org/us-a-world-news-mainmenu-35/10220-commentary-libya-yet-one-more-battleground-between-the-us-and-china.htm

In their [Charlie] Sheen-style hysteria — with U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton desperately offering “any kind of assistance” — Western politicians did not bother to consult with the people who are risking their lives to overthrow Gaddafi. At a press conference in Benghazi, the spokesman for the brand new Libyan National Transitional Council, human-rights lawyer Abdel-Hafidh Ghoga, was blunt. "We are against any foreign intervention or military intervention in our internal affairs . . . This revolution will be completed by our people."

[...]

This tsunami of hypocrisy inevitably raises the question; what does the West know about the Arab world anyway? Recently the executive board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) praised a certain northern African country for its “ambitious reform agenda” and its “strong macroeconomic performance and the progress on enhancing the role of the private sector.” The country was Libya. The IMF had only forgotten to talk to the main actors: the Libyan people.

[...]

Once again; it’s the oil, stupid. A crucial strategic factor for Washington is that post-Gaddafi Libya may represent a bonanza for U.S. Big Oil — which for the moment has been kept away from Libya. Under this perspective, Libya may be considered as yet one more battleground between the U.S. and China. But while China goes for energy and business deals in Africa, the U.S. bets on its forces in AFRICOM as well as NATO advancing “military cooperation” with the African Union.

The anti-Gaddafi movement must remain on maximum alert. It’s fair to argue the absolute majority of Libyans are using all their resourcefulness and are wiling to undergo any sacrifice to build a united, transparent, and democratic country. And they will do it on their own.

#Libye

Jadaliyya publie un excellent article récapitulant les événements du soulèvement au #Yémen.

Yemen’s Popular Uprising in Photos
►http://www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/780/yemen’s-popular-uprising-in-photos

Similar to Mubarak of Egypt, Bahrain’s Emir Hamad, and Muammar Gadhafi of Libya, Ali Abdallah Salih was more vulnerable to the 2011 popular uprisings because, during the previous decade, he cowered before American demands in the region.

http://www.jadaliyya.com/content_images/fck_images/DAY-Photo%205.jpg