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Politics : Moderate Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (5156)	12/20/2003 11:48:25 AM
From: cosmicforce	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 20773

Doesn't this worry anyone but me? Does anyone remember the "Line of Death", the fact that this man hid the perpetrators of the Lockerbie, or the botched raids against his palace that missed him but killed his family? I'm confused: I thought we learned our lessons from old Norriega, Nguyen van Thieu, Saddam and bin Laden. You don't pay dictators, strongmen or terrorists to be your friends. They aren't loyal and you'll just have to attack them or deal with their corruption later at a higher cost. reuters.com Libya to Abandon Banned Weapons, Bush Applauds Fri December 19, 2003 08:53 PM ET Bush offered the prospect of U.S. assistance for Libya in the future, saying: "As Libya becomes a more peaceful nation it can become a source of stability in Africa and the Middle East. Should Libya pursue internal reform, America will be ready to help its people to build a more free and prosperous country." The Libyan move is its second dramatic step this year to restore its standing with the international community. Libya escaped broader U.N.-imposed international sanctions earlier this year after accepting responsibility for the bombing of a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988 and paying out billions to the families of victims. Washington left its sanctions in place, citing suspicions Tripoli was seeking biological and chemical weapons. An official in London said a British team working with the Libyans had been shown "significant quantities of chemical agent" and that Libya had acknowledged that it was developing nuclear material intended to create a weapon. The team saw nuclear projects underway at more than ten sites, including uranium enrichment. It also saw dual-use sites with the potential to support work on biological weapons. It would be up to Libya to disclose the details of the weapons programs to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, as it has now agreed to do, the official said. DID IRAQ INVASION SPUR DECISION? George Joffe of the Center for International Studies at Britain's Cambridge University said the move could herald the return of U.S. oil companies to Libya. "For Libya this is very good news. The Americans have now agreed to accept one of the conditions laid down for the restoration of full relations and is therefore one step toward the removal of America's unilateral sanctions and the return of American oil companies to Libya." Richard Murphy, a former U.S. assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs now at the Council on Foreign Relations, said the U.S. invasion of Iraq "might have been a factor" in the Libyan decision but noted Tripoli had sought better relations for several years. "I would view this as a further step in the Libyan effort to restore itself as a country interested in normal, good relations ... rather than interpreting it as a move to protect itself from a Bush policy of preemption," Murphy said. But one U.S. official was not so sure. "If anything, Iraq was the icing on the cake in that it was yet another confirmation to them that they were making the right choice," the U.S. official said. "Also, did they look at North Korea?" he added. "What has North Korea gotten from its nuclear program beyond starvation and isolation?"