West should commend Qaddafi's reforms with caution

Western governments need to insist that the Libyan leader prove his good faith about democratic and judicial reform.

By John K. Cooley

from the June 22, 2007 edition

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Athens - Nearly a half-century ago, in September 1969, this reporter talked in Tripoli with a 27-year-old Libyan Royal Army lieutenant who, with some fellow young revolutionary-minded officers, had just overthrown King Idriss Senoussi in an almost bloodless coup.

Today, the whole world knows the same man, Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi, as the world's longest-lasting ruler. In 2003, he yielded to US overtures to abandon secret programs to develop nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Since then, Colonel Qaddafi; his reform-minded, Western-educated son, Saif, and Libyan diplomats work constantly to show how Libya has changed.

No longer, they proclaim, is Libya interested in acquiring WMD, blowing up Western airliners, or financing armed guerrilla and terrorist movements from South Africa to Ireland. The result of such improved behavior? Crippling economic sanctions imposed since 1982 have been lifted. Libya has been erased from the US blacklist of terrorist nations. And Libya has been able to secure new trade deals and investments in its prodigious, still partly unmapped oil and natural-gas reserves.

Outgoing British Prime Minister Tony Blair jetted to Tripoli on his farewell African tour, enthusing about his "easy personal relationship" with Qaddafi, whom US President Ronald Reagan once called "a flake." Mr. Blair snared for the global giant British Petroleum a $900 million gas-exploration contract, after authorizing new British arms deals with Libya.

American analysts and government officials used to fret over Libya's Tamoil company, which bought up refineries and service-station chains in the West. This June, Colony Capital, a California-based private-equity group run by billionaire Thomas Barrack, purchased a 65-percent controlling stake in Tamoil for $5.4 billion. Libya will retain Tamoil Africa.

But there are dark aspects to this saga. Blair's welcome of Qaddafi back into the "respectable" community of nations, following President Bush's decision last year to resume full US-Libyan diplomatic relations, allows Qaddafi, as a new soldier in the global "war on terror," to proceed ruthlessly against domestic opponents.

The humanitarian organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) is warning against a US decision to send home a Libyan Guantánamo detainee, Abdul Raouf al-Qassim. HRW says the US is ignoring Mr. Qassim's fear of torture by relying on a no-torture pledge from Libya, which has a history of torture.

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