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CNN: Interview with Qaddhafi's kid
CNN runs a Judy Woodruff interview with Muammar Qaddhafi's heir-apparent, Saif ul-Islam Qaddhafi, that echoes some of the trends we've been watching in Libya here at Rantburg. Last month Pop called for wholesale privatization in Libya, to include the oil industry, which he nationalized when he took power in 1969. Two days after Libya accepted liability for the Lockerbie bombing, he gave the public the bad news that they shouldn't be relying on oil money because it had been frittered away on grandiose adventurism — he didn't quite admit that part, but he strongly implied it. At the end of May, he made a curious speech in which he decried mindless sloganeering and said that being a non-aligned nation would be harmful to Libya.

Of particular interest has been Qaddhafi's pull away from membership in the Arab League and toward Africa, to include his courtship of an Ugandan queenlette and there was a story that he had betrothed one of his sons to the little king's sister. He's been involved in the Central African Republic — and seems to have had enough sense to write off his losses and get out. And he's probably going to end up holding a mortgage on Zim-Bob-We, as Bob gets further and further into debt to Libya, with no prospects of repayment. Libya could end up with a colony in southern Africa just by calling in their notes. Muammar seems to have gotten out of his imitative mode (Mao had a little red book, he had a little green book; Paleos and Red Brigades blew people up, he bombed Berlin discos and Pan Am airliners) and into doing a little strategizing. This might be age and maturity, it might be the influence of Saif ul-Islam, who seems a more sensible lad than the old man:
GADHAFI: Because I'm a Libyan citizen, I would like to send this message to the American people and the American government that we, the Libyan people, we want to have a more constructive and fruitful relationship with the Americans. We want to see Americans visit Libya. We want to go there to study at American universities. We want to invest in the New York Stock Exchange. We want to have Pepsi Cola, Coca-Cola. We don't want confrontation and aggression and, you know, to fight anymore. It's over. It's behind us now. It's dead with the Cold War.
To my uneducated eye, that looks like a full stop on the anti-American/anti-Globalization tour, followed by a U-turn. Woodruff hit him with Lockerbie, and his response was Arab-evasive — a matter of culture, I think, or possibly avoiding any public statements that could end up costing a state that's adventured itself into poverty even more money. He ended up saying the money — $2.7 billion, with most of it probably going to lawyers — will be deposited in a few weeks and can we just move on? (If he's really inventive and they're still malevolent or have a sense of humor, the money will take the form of the deed to Zimbabwe, which would be a hoot — watching the lawyers evict Bob and Grace when they foreclose...) Libya's signed on to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, and Saif says they have no interest in WMDs, admitting that even if they did, they don't have the technical base and manpower to do anything with them.
And plus, Libya recently has signed all of the relevant conventions regarding the WMD, and now we are members of those conventions. And because we are members, we have to be subject to international inspections and we have to be subject to other procedures regarding transparency. And therefore, I think we are on the right track, and now we are a member of those international conventions, and I think they are enough and good steps.
Saif says he's happy that Libya's in direct, face-to-face negotiations with the U.S. now, and expects to see mutual benefits to such talks.
And now we are not enemies anymore. We are not in confrontation. We are not fighting each other now. Just are sitting around the table as friends, and we are discussing our concerns.
To me, a statement like that, coming from Libya heir-apparent, has the potential to be in the same category as the Berlin Wall coming down or the Ceaucescus counting muzzle blasts, with echoes of Nixon's trip to China. I lack patience with the International Amity™ smarm merchants, but I recognize the value of diplomacy, especially when it's skillfully applied. This is an opening that I think should be exploited as soon as the money — or the deed to Zimbabwe — is in hand.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt 2003-07-23
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=16818