Time to end Nato's war in Libya

Nurse at the hosptial in Misrata in Libya looks at a boy injured in the fighting, July 2011. Photograph: Irina Kalashnikova

Πηγή: The Guardian

By Dennis Kucinich

Sunday 21 August 2011

Whether Gaddafi goes or not, this costly intervention has thwarted peace talks and betrayed its 'humanitarian' mission

In March of this year, the US, France, Britain and their North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) allies launched military operations in Libya under the guise of a "humanitarian intervention". US diplomats and world leaders carelessly voiced unsubstantiated claims of an impending massacre in Benghazi. You hear no such appeals to humanity while Nato, in the name of the rebels (whoever they are), prepares to lay siege to Tripoli, a city of nearly 2 million people.

Libyan rebels are now advancing on the capital city of Tripoli with the aid of Nato strikes; this is sure to result in a real bloodbath, as opposed to the one that was conjured in Benghazi this past winter. Nato is assisting rebels who are blocking food, water and medical supplies from coming into the capital city, and is stopping those who need advanced medical care from travelling to Tunisia to access it. Nato is bombing power stations, creating blackouts, and using Apache helicopters to attack Libyan police checkpoints to clear roads for rebels to advance.

Regardless of whether Muammar Gaddafi is ousted in coming days, the war against Libya has seen countless violations of United Nations security council resolutions (UNSCRs) by Nato and UN member states. The funnelling of weapons (now being air-dropped) to Libyan rebels was, from the beginning of the conflict, in clear violation of UNSCR 1970. The use of military force on behalf of the rebels, in an attempt to impose regime change, has undermined international law and damaged the credibility of the United Nations. Countless innocent civilians have been killed, and Nato air strikes continue to place many at great risk.

So much for the humanitarian-inspired UNSCR 1973 as a means to protect civilians. The people of Libya cannot take another month of such humanitarian intervention.

The leading donor nations of Nato – the US, France and Great Britain – have been free to prosecute war under the cloak of this faceless, bureaucratic, alphabet security agency, now multinational war machine, which can violate UN resolutions and kill innocent civilians with impunity. War crimes trials are only for losers. The prospective conquerors, the western powers and their rebel proxies, will then expect to be able to assert control over Libya's vast oil and natural gas reserves.

The US share of the war against Libya has probably exceeded the $1bn mark. This extraordinary amount of money for an intervention that Americans were told would last "days not weeks" could only be explained by looking at the war as an investment, and at control over Libya's wealth as an opportunity to make a return on that investment. Cynical? Then tell me why else we are at war in Libya.

Viable peace proposals, such as the one put forward by the African Union (AU), have been quickly and summarily rejected. If there is going to be a peaceful resolution of the conflict, the US must work with and empower the AU to ensure regional security. The AU has proposed a peace plan that would facilitate an immediate ceasefire, the unhindered delivery of humanitarian aid, a dialogue between the Transitional National Council and the Gaddafi government, and the suspension of Nato strikes.

The use of force and ultimatums has not worked. As the war enters its sixth month, it is time for the US president and secretary of state to clean up the mess they've created with this needless military intervention, and to work to seriously to bring about a negotiated end to this war.

In June, I proposed a peace plan (pdf) derived in part from the efforts of the AU. This plan calls for an immediate ceasefire and lays out the principles necessary to create a framework to achieve reconciliation and national unity in Libya by a meaningful process. In its June report on Libya, the International Crisis Group stated:

"A political breakthrough is by far the best way out of the costly situation created by the military impasse. This will require a ceasefire between the regime and the Transitional National Council, the deployment of a peacekeeping force to monitor and guarantee this under a UN mandate, and the immediate opening of serious negotiations between regime and opposition representatives to secure agreement on a peaceful transition to a new, more legitimate political order. Nato and those states supporting its military action should facilitate this development, not hinder it."

I have recently received several reports indicating that a settlement was close, only to be scuttled by state department officials. Given that the department of state seems to have taken a singular role in launching the US into this war, it is more than disconcerting to hear that the same agency has played a role in frustrating a resolution to this conflict. There are viable solutions to peacefully end the conflict, if there is a desire to do so.

Continued military action promotes a cycle of violence that will persist whether Colonel Gaddafi is ousted or not. On 19 March 2003, the United States pursued regime change in Iraq. Eight years later, we're still wondering why the people of Iraq are not sufficiently grateful for our intervention, which has resulted in the death of over 1 million of their fellow countrymen and women.

How can we expect this grim manifesto of interventionism to ever result in anything but tragedy? It's time to end the war against Libya.

UN sends mixed signals on civilian deaths in Libya

Πηγή: Reuters
Aug 15, 2011, 11:31 EDT


The United Nations has been sending mixed signals lately about NATO’s record with civilian casualties in the alliance’s sixth month of air strikes against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s troops and military sites. U.N. officials and diplomats said it was hardly surprising that different senior officials at the world body are finding it hard to keep a consistent line on the conflict, which, back in March, most of them had hoped would be over in a few weeks.

But it has dragged on. Now Gaddafi’s government is complaining about what it says are mounting civilian casualties caused by NATO bombs, many of them children. Diplomats from alliance members acknowledge that there have been some civilian casualties, which they regret. But they question some of the figures that have been coming out of Tripoli. Libya’s state television, which was targeted by NATO late last month, regularly broadcasts gory images of blood-soaked bodies it says are civilians being pulled from rubble after NATO bomb attacks.

Last week the head of the U.N. cultural and scientific agency UNESCO, Irina Bokova, issued an unusually sharp rebuke of the alliance for its July 30 air strikes against Libyan state television, which she said killed several “media workers.”

“I deplore the NATO strike on Al-Jamahiriya and its installations,” Bokova said in a statement. “Media outlets should not be targeted in military actions.”

Several U.N. diplomats from NATO member states privately expressed surprise at the statement from Bokova, herself a citizen of NATO member Bulgaria. Asked about her criticism, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s deputy spokesman Farhan Haq suggested that Ban was not overly concerned with the performance of NATO in Libya.

“In terms of that, we would need further details about what the operations were that were conducted. But certainly, the Secretary-General believes that resolution 1973 has been used properly in order to protect civilians in Libya and he has continually emphasized the need, as this proceeds, to make sure that civilians in Libya will be protected.”

NATO defended the attack on Libyan television and said it had no evidence that anyone was killed during the strikes.

With Ban’s backing, NATO began launching air strikes against Gaddafi’s forces in March on the basis of Security Council resolution 1973. That resolution authorized U.N. member states to enforce a no-fly zone over Libya and to take “all necessary measures” to protect civilians short of occupying the country.

Russia, China, Brazil, South Africa and India — the so-called BRICS developing countries — seized on Bokova’s statement and brought it up during a closed-door meeting of the U.N. Security Council this week. One senior council diplomat said it was clearly a coordinated and pre-planned effort on the part of the BRICS to launch a surprise assault on Britain, France, the United States and other members of the NATO alliance that have been attacking forces loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi since March.

Two days after expressing Ban’s satisfaction with the protection of civilians in Libya, the U.N. press office issued a statement with a very different tone: “The Secretary-General is deeply concerned by reports of the unacceptably large number of civilian casualties as a result of the conflict in Libya.”

Although it did not explicitly blame NATO, diplomats and U.N. officials said the statement was clearly referring to the alliance. Diplomats said that Ban’s team of close advisers received several phone calls from Western diplomats who took offense at Ban’s statement. One envoy said of it: “It’s what the Russians would call a balanced statement.” They said it was certain to win praise from the disgruntled BRICS nations, four of which abstained from the March 17 vote on resolution 1973, allowing it to pass while making clear they had reservations about it. (South Africa, whose delegation in New York is now one of the most vocal critics of NATO operations in Libya, was the only BRICS nation to vote for 1973.)

The following day Haq issued a clarification of Ban’s statement, saying that Ban “of course recognizes and appreciates NATO efforts to avoid civilian casualties.”

Libya: world leaders kick start peace negotiations as US recognises rebels

Rebels make their way to the front line west of Ajdabiya Photo: REUTERS

Πηγή: The Telegraph

By Richard Spencer, Middle East Correspondent

7:57PM BST 15 Jul 2011

World leaders on Friday told a UN special envoy to negotiate a peace deal with Col Gaddafi that could see Libyan leader stay in the country after stepping down.
Abdul Elah al-Khatib, the special envoy, was asked by the Turkish foreign minister, host of a one-day summit attended by Nato and other leaders, to present a peace deal in the next two weeks.
It would have to be negotiated first not only with Col Gaddafi but with the rebel leadership in Benghazi.
Nato also increased the military and diplomatic pressure on the Gaddafi regime in careful mix of carrot and stick.

William Hague, the foreign secretary, said Britain was committing four more Tornado reconnaissance aircraft to the bombing campaign against Libya.
The United States said it was formally recognising the rebel Transitional National Council as the “legitimate governing authority” for Libya, a decision that could free up funds seized from the regime under United Nations resolutions.

Hillary Clinton, US secretary of state, said that she would authorise the legal work necessary before Washington and the UN can release the frozen funds, estimated at up to USD34 billion, more than £20 billion.
The Libya “contact group” meeting in Istanbul was an attempt to present a common international front on the country’s civil war.
China and Russia, critics of the Nato bombing campaign, refused to attend.
NATO, while keen to paper over cracks that have appeared in the coalition’s stance in recent weeks, softened its insistence there could be no negotiations until Col Gaddafi stood down.

Turkey, which is not part of the coalition, went further than any other Nato member on the eve of the talks, calling for a ceasefire to be implemented throughout the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which this year starts on August 1.
It also proposed talks to enable Col Gaddafi to step down while remaining in Libya, the Turkish foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, said. That might require revisions to United Nations resolutions.
“An exit strategy for Gadhafi to leave power, but not necessarily the country, should be sought by revising the UN Resolution 1973 if necessary,” he said in a briefing. He later added that he hoped Mr Khatib would find a political solution by the beginning of Ramadan.

Britain and the United States remain sceptical. Britain’s official position, is that it has a “strong preference” that Col Gaddafi be handed over for trial at the International Criminal Court, which has indicted him, his son Saif al-Islam and his security chief Abdullah al-Senussi for war crimes.

But it does not regard this as a “red line” and would accept him staying in the country if the rebels did, according to officials.

Mr al-Khatib will be given freedom to negotiate within four “red lines”.

These are broadly that Col Gaddafi must stand down, Libya must remain united, “justice” must be assured for the victims of repression, and there must be an “inclusive” transition process.

British planning for a post-Gaddafi period includes leaving some of the regime’s security forces in place to guarantee law and order.

Col Gaddafi is said to have offered “peace feelers” in recent days, although in a television broadcast on Thursday night he said he would “fight to the end”.

In a direct response last night, he said the recognition by the USA and others of the rebels was “insignificant”.

“Trample on those recognitions, trample on them under your feet,” he said.

“They are worthless.”

He is said to want Saif al-Islam to have a role in government even if he himself stands aside, but that would be unacceptable both to the rebels and to the international community.

It is not clear whether it would be practical for him to stay in Libya if he did step down. It has been suggested he could live under UN supervision in his tribal home of Sabha, in the southern desert, but that would mean giving him guarantees that he would not be handed over to the ICC in future, which western countries would find hard to do.

The added firepower Britain is promising, along with the extra money that might be on its way, will be welcomed by the TNC, which claims rebel-held areas are suffering severe shortages. It is also demanding more help from Nato to push its military campaign forward.

It said it did not expect a ceasefire until after Col Gaddafi had been defeated.