Unrest reported in Libya

[Blagger]

British Soldiers Reportedly Captured by Libyan Rebels During Secret Mission - FoxNews.com

Libyan rebels capture British soldiers - World news - Mideast/N. Africa - msnbc.com

I can see why they'd be there after the Lockerbie bombing and everything. I'd like to hear a perspective from a British citizen.

British involvement in Libya is hazy to say the least. Apart from oil, we don't (to the best of my knowledge) have any tangible interests in Libya.

But there's more.

During the mid '90s, it was revealed by a rogue MI5 agent, David Shayler, that Britain's MI6 had plotted with an opposition group (Libyan Islamic Fighting Group) to assassinate Gaddafi. They planted a bomb under his motorcade, but the bomb was planted under the wrong car. Gaddafi survived but several civilians died in the blast.

I can't be sure, but the UK may be attempting to influence the uprising in Libya by supporting rebel forces with special forces [SAS] personnel.

I hope that helps, xsited1.


Below you'll find more information on MI6's involvement in Libya:

MI6's failed assassination attempt on Gaddafi - BBC

Further testimony - BBC

 

[waltky]

Thought they were going in to rescue British oil workers and their families...

Britain's SAS in Libya: What happened there?
The confusion surrounding the detention and then release of several British nationals – including members of the Special Air Service – in Libya has generated as much interest as the incident itself. However, little information is available on why a group of British men arrived unauthorized and unannounced in Libya. Below is an overview of what can be confirmed about the incident.

What do we know about the incident?

SAS soldiers and members of the British intelligence unit MI6 were escorting British diplomats into eastern Libya to build connections with Libyan opposition leaders, The Guardian reports. They were dropped by helicopter outside Benghazi and were reportedly detained Thursday by rebel commanders who suspected them of being mercenaries because of the reconnaissance and military equipment they carried.

British Foreign Secretary William Hague, who approved the mission, gave a brief explanation to members of Parliament Monday afternoon local time:

Last week I authorised the dispatch of a small diplomatic team to Eastern Libya in uncertain circumstances which we judged required their protection to build on these initial contacts [with the Libyan opposition] and to assess the scope for closer diplomatic dialogue. I pay tribute to that team. They were withdrawn yesterday after a serious misunderstanding about their role leading to temporary detention. This situation was resolved and they were able to meet [an opposition leader]. However it was clearly better for this team to be withdrawn.

Rebel forces have asked why the SAS/MI6 group came in so secretively if they were an official group tasked with guiding diplomats to the opposition. “If this is an official delegation, why did they come with a helicopter? Why didn’t they [inform the revolutionary council] …?” asked Mustafa Gheriani, a spokesman for the opposition, according to the Guardian.

MORE

 

[Momanohedhunter]

I'm reasonably confident that Britain is not part of 'our' government.

That's why I had "our" in italics.

Several folks pushing the administration into getting involved, the right answer is NO. Stay OUT of it.

Staying out of it would also mean keeping our traps shut about what should or should not happen. Obama has no business telling Gahdafi to go when he has no intention of doing anything to make him leave.

True, I dont think he, or the rest of the country has the stomach for more action in the Middle East/Africa. Even air strikes could be hairy if a pilot were shot down, or civilians were killed.

 

[Momanohedhunter]

British Soldiers Reportedly Captured by Libyan Rebels During Secret Mission - FoxNews.com

Libyan rebels capture British soldiers - World news - Mideast/N. Africa - msnbc.com

I can see why they'd be there after the Lockerbie bombing and everything. I'd like to hear a perspective from a British citizen.

British involvement in Libya is hazy to say the least. Apart from oil, we don't (to the best of my knowledge) have any tangible interests in Libya.

But there's more.

During the mid '90s, it was revealed by a rogue MI5 agent, David Shayler, that Britain's MI6 had plotted with an opposition group (Libyan Islamic Fighting Group) to assassinate Gaddafi. They planted a bomb under his motorcade, but the bomb was planted under the wrong car. Gaddafi survived but several civilians died in the blast.

I can't be sure, but the UK may be attempting to influence the uprising in Libya by supporting rebel forces with special forces [SAS] personnel.

I hope that helps, xsited1.


Below you'll find more information on MI6's involvement in Libya:

MI6's failed assassination attempt on Gaddafi - BBC

Further testimony - BBC

Do you think they would help them out by giving the rebels the means to shoot down air craft ?

 

[Rat in the Hat]

I just saw this report also. Supposedly they were trying to get a British diplomat to meet with anti-Quadaffi(spelling?) supporters....looks like they got their wish.

Don't worry about the spelling.

At last count, there are 4,275 acceptable ways to spell that goofball's name.

By the end of next month, it will be over 10,000.

 

[High_Gravity]

TRIPOLI, Libya — As wealthier nations send boats and planes to rescue their citizens from the violence in Libya, a new refugee crisis is taking shape on the outskirts of Tripoli, where thousands of migrant workers from sub-Saharan Africa have been trapped with scant food and water, no international aid and little hope of escape.

A man prayed among his fellow refugees from Ghana at a camp in Tunisia near the Libya border.
The migrants — many of them illegal immigrants from Ghana and Nigeria who have long constituted an impoverished underclass in Libya — live amid piles of garbage, sleep in makeshift tents of blankets strung from fences and trees, and breathe fumes from a trench of excrement dividing their camp from the parking lot of Tripoli’s airport.

For dinner on Monday night two men killed a scrawny, half-plucked chicken by dunking it in water boiled on a garbage fire, then hacked it apart with a dull knife and cooked it over an open fire. Some residents of the camp are as young as Essem Ighalo, 9 days old, who arrived on his second day of life and has yet to see a doctor. Many refugees said they had seen deaths from hunger and disease every night.

The airport refugees, along with tens of thousands of other African migrants lucky enough to make it across the border to Tunisia, are the most desperate contingent of a vast exodus that has already sent almost 200,000 foreigners fleeing the country since the outbreak of the popular revolt against Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi nearly three weeks ago.

Dark-skinned Africans say the Libyan war has caught them in a vise. The heavily armed police and militia forces loyal to Colonel Qaddafi who guard checkpoints along the roads around the capital rob them of their money, possessions and cellphone chips, the migrants say. And the Libyans who oppose Colonel Qaddafi lash out at the African migrants because they look like the dark-skinned mercenaries many here say the Libyan leader has recruited to crush the uprising.

“Qaddafi has brought African soldiers to kill some of them, so if they see black people they beat them,” said Samson Adda, 31, who said residents of Zawiyah, a rebellious city, had beaten him so badly that he could no longer walk.

Sub-Saharan Africans make up a vast majority of the estimated 1.5 million illegal immigrants among Libya’s population of 6.5 million, according to the International Organization for Migration. Many were desperately poor people made even more so by investments of up to $1,000 each to pay smugglers to bring them across Libya’s southern border for a chance at better work in its oil economy.

Their flight has emptied the streets of thousands of day laborers who played a crucial, if largely unheralded, role in sustaining Libya’s economy. Their absence has played a role in halting construction projects that had been rising across the skyline.

They are trapped in part because most lack passports or other documents necessary to board a plane or cross the border. Few can afford a plane ticket. They say they are afraid to leave the airport or try their luck on the roads to the border for fear of assaults by Libyan citizens or at militia checkpoints.

They complain bitterly of betrayal by their home governments, which have failed to help evacuate them even as Egyptian, Bangladeshi and Chinese migrant workers who crowded the airport a week ago have found a way out.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/world/middleeast/08refugees.html?ref=world

 

[High_Gravity]

Libya Air Strikes Hit Rebels At Oil Port

BREAKING NEWS:

Forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi have scored a significant victory, recapturing the closest city to the capital to have fallen in rebel hands. On another front near the opposition-held east, loyalists trying to stop anti-government fighters from advancing toward the capital pounded the rebels with airstrikes and rockets.


RAS LANOUF, Libya -- Libyan warplanes launched at least five new airstrikes Tuesday near rebel positions in the oil port of Ras Lanouf, keeping up a counteroffensive to prevent the opposition from advancing toward leader Moammar Gadhafi's stronghold in the capital Tripoli.

There was no immediate word on casualties, and an Associated Press reporter who witnessed the strikes said they did not appear to hit any fighters. The latest airstrike hit a two-story house in a residential area, causing some damage but not hurting anyone.

Representatives of the opposition, which controls the eastern half of Libya, said they have received an offer to negotiate the terms of Gadhafi's departure. However, they could not confirm whether the envoy who made the offer was authorized by the regime to do so and said in any case, they would not negotiate with the government.

Gadhafi's regime has been using its air power advantage more each day to check a rebel advance west toward Tripoli on the main highway leading out of the opposition-controlled eastern half of the country. The increasing use of air power underlines the vulnerability of the rebel forces as they attempt to march in open terrain along the Mediterranean coast and could prompt world powers to impose a no-fly zone over Libya to deny Gadhafi that edge.

Libya Air Strikes Hit Rebels At Oil Port

 

[High_Gravity]

Why black Africans are paying the price for the real or perceived use of mercenaries in Libya

A cocked pistol points near the head of the black African teenager. A Libyan rebel barks questions in Arabic, waving an accusing finger as he suggests his captive is a paid pro-government mercenary. The youth’s face freezes with muted terror.

It’s an extraordinarily powerful image, one printed prominently in dozens of newspapers last week. And what makes it all the more potent are the details that the photographer could not capture in his frame.

Held and interrogated, do these men look like Gadhafi's mercenaries? Fact check
Libya's military: how strong are Gadhafi's forces? “Honestly, he didn’t look to me as a mercenary at all,” Reuters’ Goran Tomasevic told The Globe and Mail from Ras Lanuf, the town near where he shot the photo.

The war photographer spoke of how he stumbled on the scene at a rebel checkpoint. There, angry onlookers were egging the interrogators on, claiming the youth – likely from Niger – had already “confessed” to being a foreign fighter. Yet he denied it, again and again.

Such scenes are playing out across Libya these days, as the uprising fuels friend-or-foe fears that resuscitate long-dormant tensions between mostly Arab citizens and foreign workers. “The black African, or sub-Saharan African population is, without any question, suffering repercussions and revenge attacks, for the real or perceived use of mercenaries by Gadhafi forces,” said Fred Abrahams of Human Rights Watch in New York.

Why black Africans are paying the price for the real or perceived use of mercenaries in Libya - The Globe and Mail

 

[High_Gravity]

Libya Official Flies To Egypt With Gaddafi Message

CAIRO -- A high-ranking member of the Libyan military landed in Cairo on Wednesday and embassy staff told Egyptian officials that he was carrying a message from embattled leader Moammar Gaddafi.

A Egyptian army official told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity that Maj. Gen Abdul-Rahman bin Ali al-Saiid al-Zawi, the head of Libya's logistics and supply authority, was asking to meet Egypt's military rulers.

No further details were immediately available.

After weeks of dramatic setbacks, Gaddafi appears to have at least temporarily seized the momentum in his fight against rebels trying to move on the capital, Tripoli, from territory they hold in eastern Libya.

The two sides traded barrages of artillery shells and rockets about 12 miles (20 kilometers)west of the oil port of Ras Lanouf, an indication that regime forces were much closer to the city than previously known.

Gaddafi's successes have left Western powers struggling to come up with a plan to support the rebels without becomg ensnared in the complex and fast-moving conflict.

President Barack Obama's most senior advisers were meeting Wednesday to outline what steps are realistic and possible to pressure Gaddafi to halt the violence and give up power.

They planned to examine the ramifications of a no-fly zone over Libya and other potential military options, although the final decision will rest with Obama, U.S. officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss internal administration deliberations.

Britain and France are pushing for the U.N. to create a no-fly zone over Libya, and while the U.S. may be persuaded to sign on, such a move is unlikely to win the backing of veto-wielding Security Council members Russia and China, which traditionally object to such steps as infringements on national sovereignty.

Libya Official Flies To Egypt With Gaddafi Message

 

[Confident]

In Libya, the USA is hesitant about imposing a no-fly zone, what does it mean?

The Arab foreign ministers have now taken another important and responsible decision regarding Libya. After suspending Libya's membership to the Arab League, the Arabs decided to call on the international Security Council to shoulder its responsibilities by immediately imposing a no-fly zone on Libyan military planes, and to establish a safe zone in areas that are facing bombardment, in order to protect the Libyan people from the regime.

Therefore, today the ball is in the court of the international community, which must carry out its duty to protect the people of Libya from the tyranny that it is being subjected to at the hands of the regime.

The West and the US of course were hesitant about imposing a no-fly zone for several reasons; one of which was that there was no unified Arab position on the issue. Now the GCC, and the Arab League, have invalidated that excuse. The West has all the capacities and mechanisms to apply the no-fly zone, in order to save the Libyan people from the tyranny that is being perpetrated by Gaddafi.

Perhaps some Western states, including the US, believe that the Gaddafi regime might win on the ground, and this is a natural conviction, because the regime is not hesitating to use all of its military power, let alone mercenaries. But if the Libyan regime does prevail by crushing its own people, how can there ever be cooperation with it? What about human rights? What about international laws and conventions?

Germany and France were quick to welcome the Arab League resolution, even though the Germans were asking: how can the Arab League call for a no-fly zone whilst rejecting foreign intervention? The answer is simple; the decision to impose a no-fly zone will come from the Security Council, and therefore it has international legitimacy, and is not an individual act by one state in particular. Consequently, there must be a unified European and American position, and the imposition of the no-fly zone must be carried out quickly through the Security Council. Of course, this will be a tough diplomatic battle, but the foundations are in place, and the justifications are genuine.

The priority now, and the most important today is to protect the Libyan people. We must also realize that the Libyan regime has lost its legitimacy; therefore any initiative should not only be clear, but should also not aim to restore credibility to Gaddafi's regime.

What happened in Libya is of course different to what happened in Egypt or Tunisia, as the military institutions in those countries demonstrated a sense of responsibility. Perhaps what is happening today in Sanaa, or what is about to happen, is most similar to what is happening in Libya. There is now a genuine need for caution, so that Yemen is not dragged into a civil war. But what is urgently required today is that the Libyan people are given protection, as soon as possible.​

 

[Mini 14]

We should stay out of it.

Let the Libyans kill each other. We have our own problems to deal with.

 

[Two Thumbs]

I never thought I'd be on the same side as the Russians.

Let the Libyans work it out amoung themselves.

If the world gave a damn about being humane we (the world) would have destroyed every country in the ME that produces oil.

As it is, we will deal with who ever wins.

 

[Confident]

We should stay out of it.

Let the Libyans kill each other. We have our own problems to deal with.

what about Iraq?
why did you sacrifice thousands of Americans in Iraq? see this:Cost of War to the United States | COSTOFWAR.COM
What is the purpose of the invasion of Iraq?
Why did you Interfere in Tunisia and Egypt and you stood against Hosni and Ben Ali?

 

[Mini 14]

We should stay out of it.

Let the Libyans kill each other. We have our own problems to deal with.

what about Iraq?
why did you sacrifice thousands of Americans in Iraq? see this:Cost of War to the United States | COSTOFWAR.COM
What is the purpose of the invasion of Iraq?
Why did you Interfere in Tunisia and Egypt and you stood against Hosni and Ben Ali?

We could afford to then.

Now, we can't.

Ask China for help. They're fine.

 

[Confident]

Let the Libyans kill each other..

As it is, we will deal with who ever wins.

ok!! is this the ethics, values, and principles of America?
whyd did you stand against Hosni and Bin Ali?
or Muammar Gaddafi is a sincere friend of America and his validity is not over?

 

[Two Thumbs]

Let the Libyans kill each other..

As it is, we will deal with who ever wins.

ok!! is this the ethics, values, and principles of America?
whyd did you stand against Hosni and Bin Ali? Who?
or Muammar Gaddafi is a sincere friend of America and his validity is not over? Gaddafi is a wanted criminal in America.

As far as our principles go;

If we help; Americans die and you call us the Great Satan.
If we don't help; No Americans die and you call us the Great Satan.

So you will excuse me if I don't want my sons dead for a bunch of filth that call me the great satan and will kill me, my wife and my kids for not being muslims.

Learn to show respect BEFORE you need our help.

 

[Cmdr Sheppard]

Finally we are doing something about that one crazy terrorist leader guy.

Libya's defense ministry warned Thursday that any military action against the African nation resulting from a possible U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing airstrikes and other measures will be met with retaliatory strikes on air and sea traffic in the Mediterranean region.

Reuters reported that a statement by the regime of Muammar al-Qaddafi broadcast on Libyan television warned that "the Mediterranean basin will face danger not just in the short-term, but also in the long term."

Read more: Libya Threatens Retaliation as U.S. Seeks UN Resolution Authorizing Strikes - FoxNews.com

 

[waltky]

Obama not draggin' his feet against Khaddafi...

Clinton Denies Obama Administration Is Dragging Its Feet While Gaddafi Crushes Rebels
Thursday, March 17, 2011 – As the son of Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi crowed Wednesday that government forces would defeat rebels in their Benghazi base “within 48 hours,” the head of a U.S.-based group promoting democracy in Libya voiced frustration and regret at the international response to the crisis.

He singled out for criticism the Obama administration, which he said had given “not a whimper of support” to the provisional council representing the anti-Gaddafi rebellion. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in a series of interviews in Cairo Wednesday spoke of a new “urgency” and expressed the hope that the U.N. Security Council could vote as early as Thursday on a draft resolution authorizing actions including a “no-fly zone.”

“There is a sense of urgency because Colonel Gaddafi and his forces are moving east, and so we want to see the Security Council act as soon as possible,” she told Egypt’s Nile TV. Clinton, who met with a Libyan National Council rebel leader in Paris on Monday, characterized last weekend’s call by the Arab League for the Security Council to act as a game-changer.

“As we consult in New York on a U.N. resolution, there’s a much greater openness than there was a week ago,” she told CBS television.

MORE

 

[Mr. H.]

French/British will do the bombing.

My guess is, the G meister is cramming civilians into command/control and air defense installations.

 

[tigerbob]

No fly zone was approved yesterday, British cabinet met this morning to review legal advice, and it now appears that there will be a vote in Parliament on Monday to approve the commitment of UK forces. As Labour have indicated they will support it, this seems like a formality.

So, here's my question.

If we have known (as we have) that a no fly zone was likely / possible, I assume that military planning has been ongoing for several days. Why do the Libyan people (who have been getting the crap kicked out of them for weeks now) now have to wait a further 3 days before even a vote is taken?

Why is the vote not being taken today, passed, and the green light given to the military to commence operations as soon as they and their military partners are ready to do so? Given the language used about humanitarian responsibilities, the lack of urgency is hard to understand.