U.S. Keeps Libya Travel Ban
By Elaine Monaghan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States extended a ban on U.S. passport holders traveling to Libya by one year on Friday in a move claimed as a victory by relatives of people killed in the 1988 airliner bombing over Lockerbie.
State Department spokesman Philip Reeker said Secretary of State Madeleine Albright (news - web sites) had taken into account violence in the Middle East region and an increase in anti-American sentiment there as a whole in taking the decision.
``She determined that questions remain about the safety of American citizens in Libya,'' Reeker said.
Holders of U.S. passports have been barred from using them for travel to Libya since Washington cut diplomatic ties with Tripoli in 1981. The ban, which allows for exceptions only by special State Department waiver, is reviewed annually.
Albright had been expected to extend the restriction by a shorter period in a nod to the view it is outdated. Hundreds of Americans work in Libya's oil industry despite the ban.
But Reeker cited reports of internal violence in Libya which had killed 50 people and wounded hundreds more and anti-Israeli and anti-U.S. protests since the recent unrest in the Middle East as reasons for keeping the ban in place.
Lifting the ban while the trial continues of two Libyans charged with the bombing of a U.S. jet over the Scottish town of Lockerbie would have sparked a torrent of criticism.
Sen. Edward Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, welcomed the move, saying, ``Secretary Albright has made the right decision. The travel ban has been in effect since 1981 and it deserves to be extended for another year.''
He added, ``The trial of the suspects in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 is still taking place and the travel ban should remain in place as well.''
Albright has effectively left the decision on the ban to the next administration, which takes over Jan. 20.
``We consider this a victory,'' said Dan Cohen of Cape May Court House, New Jersey, whose daughter, Theodora, 20, was killed in the blast, which took 270 lives.
The view that the ban is outdated was apparently confirmed by a U.S. consular mission which visited Libya in March but whose findings have never been released.
Palestinian Deaths Spark Protests
But since then the high proportion of Palestinian deaths in clashes with Israeli forces has sparked protests across the Arab and Muslim world at Israel's use of force and the U.S. role as its most powerful ally and main peace broker.
A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said recently the mission had found there was little basis for the ban, whose criterion is that Americans face ``imminent danger.''
No other Middle East nation carries such a restriction, but a U.S. official said Albright felt the timing was not right to lift the restriction against Libya. ''She is concerned about Libya's commitment to a comprehensive and enduring cessation of support for terrorist activities,'' Reeker said.
The other U.S. official said that in theory the decision on the ban had nothing to do with the lengthy trial of the two Libyans, which opened in May and has frequently adjourned because of disputes over evidence.
The Libyans, Abdel Basset al-Megrahi and Al-Amin Khalifa Fahima, are accused of planting a bomb aboard the Pan Am plane. Its victims included 189 Americans.
Libya handed the men over for trial last year, winning the suspension of U.N. sanctions.
A vocal group of the Lockerbie relatives opposes any sign of U.S. rapprochement with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. |
