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| Africa: North | ||
| Real reason for Gaddafi’s WMD surrender | ||
| 2003-12-21 | ||
| Hat tip to Drudge. EFL. Libya’s promise to surrender its weapons of mass destruction was forced by Britain and America’s seizure of physical evidence of Col Muammar Gaddafi’s illegal weapons programme, the Telegraph can reveal. United States officials say that America’s hand was strengthened in negotiations with Col Gaddafi after a successful operation, previously undisclosed, to intercept transport suspected of carrying banned weapons. MI6 and the CIA had a good day, it seems! The operation is said to have been carried out under the Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI), an international, American-led scheme to halt the spread of WMD by seizing them in transit. The PSI was first mooted by President George W Bush in May but was not officially launched until September. Last week, a senior official from the US State Department confirmed that the PSI had "netted several seizures", although he refused to give further details. All beware the PSI, heh-heh! President Bush and Tony Blair had praised Libya’s decision to give up its WMD and allow international inspectors to oversee their destruction. Let him off easy in public, bust his chops in private. The PSI operation, however, added decisively to the pressure already brought to bear on Col Gaddafi by America and Britain as they prepared to attack Iraq in March. One Cabinet minister said: "It demonstrates that change can be brought about by standing tough. There is no question that this change of heart by Gaddafi was brought about by the fact that the US and Britain were seen to be standing up to and called Saddam Hussein’s bluff." Evidence + will = Q’duck’s change of heart. The Travellers Club in Pall Mall, beloved of spy novelists and frequented by senior officers in the intelligence services, was the venue last week for the final breakthrough talks between MI6 and Libyan intelligence officials. If walls could talk ... British immigration rules were discreetly changed to allow the Libyans to enter the country on visas. Three Libyan officials met a four-strong British team led by William Ehrman, the director general of defence and intelligence at the Foreign Office, and including two MI6 officers, to agree the text that would be read out on Libyan television on Friday night. Mr Blair was forced to wait until the Libyan statement had been taken down by the BBC monitoring unit, translated and its contents checked to make sure they tallied with the agreed text before he was given the go-ahead to make his announcement in Durham during the 10pm news broadcasts.
We’re makin’ a list, checkin’ it twice ... In June, John Bolton, the under-secretary of state for arms control and international security, warned that the regime was exploiting the suspension of United Nations sanctions after the Lockerbie trial. "Since the sanctions were lifted, Libya has been able to be more aggressive in pursuing weapons of mass destruction. Libyan agents are trying to acquire dual-use technology. That is very worrying," he said. Apparently that’s been fixed.
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| Posted by:Steve White |
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| Posted by: Hyper 2003-12-21 1:31:03 PM |
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| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2003-12-21 11:23:58 AM |
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| Posted by: snellenr 2003-12-21 10:24:48 AM |
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| Posted by: Robert Crawford 2003-12-21 9:12:55 AM |
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| Posted by: Frank G 2003-12-21 7:35:42 AM |