Analysis: Meeting between Tony Blair and the Foreign Minister of Libya

February 11, 2004
www.1924.org

The meeting between the British Prime Minister Tony Blair and the Libyan Foreign Minister Abdul Rahman Shalgam is the culmination of British efforts to ease Libya’s admission into the community of nations. That is why Mr Shalgam was given the red-carpet treatment in London and had dinner with both Mr Straw and Mr Blair. Mr Straw said the visit was "truly historic" and "tangible proof of the proof of the improving relations between Libya and the United Kingdom"

Since 1992, Britain has been actively involved in protecting the Gaddafi regime and British interests in Libya, Africa and the Muslim world from American aspiration to control Libya and her interests

Britain’s carefully crafted strategy of using Nelson Mandella to resolve the Lockerbie crisis, force the lifting of UN sanctions and tie compensation payments to the lifting of US sanctions and removal of Libya from the list of countries that sponsor terrorism has paid off.

Furthermore, the announcement last year that Libya is willing to dismantle its WMD has made it difficult for the US to justify regime change. The BBC reported that a senior British official said that the Libyan leader has done everything he promised over the last 18 months. "We've gradually seen the pieces of the jigsaw falling into place".

Therefore Britain has been successful at removing most of the prominent reasons put forward by American policy makers which provided the US with the necessary pretext to invade Libya.

Nevertheless, there are still some reservations in some US circles, but at the moment there is no sign that this is going to be translated into official policy. Besides, Bush desperately needs to please the oil industry that so far has been deprived of the lucrative Iraqi oil due to the poor security situation in the country. By restoring diplomatic relations Bush can provide access for the oil conglomerates to the much-coveted Libyan oil. Hence the visit last month of US congressmen to Libya and the tripartite talks held last week in London resulted in and the upgrading of Libyan and American diplomatic relations. The US State Department has confirmed that it has one diplomat stationed in Tripoli. It is expected that full diplomatic relations will be restored sometime this year.

Also the British government is keen to separate the war in Iraq and Libya’s decision to dismantle WMD. Jack Straw, the Foreign Secretary, asked whether the British Government saw the war in Iraq as responsible for Libya's apparent change of policy on its weapons, pointed out that the rapprochement with Libya had begun in the late Nineties.

The "breakthrough" had come with the visit of the Foreign Office minister, Mike O'Brien, to Tripoli 18 months ago, "a good while before military action was contemplated in respect of Iraq". But, he insisted, he would not "claim any crude connection ... between military action in Iraq and what has happened in Iraq and in Libya".

The reason for this is that Britain is keen to emphasis to the world that the policy of engagement with the so called rogue nations is much better than the policy of regime change and use of military intervention as advocated by the Bush administration. "This shows that you can get somewhere by dialogue, rather than confrontation", said Edward Chaplin, Head of the Middle East & North Africa Section of the Foreign Office in London.

Prince Charles visit to Iran should be viewed in the same light and not as suggested by Andrew Dunn, of the British Embassy in Tehran, who said before the visit: "Prince Charles is patron of the British Red Cross and he is coming in that role." "It's a completely non-political visit." The visit was a show of British support to the conservative Iranian government and contrasts sharply with Washington’s approach towards Iran. The visit came amid celebrations marking the 25th anniversary of the creation of the Islamic republic in 1979 and days before important elections in which the conservative leadership has barred many candidates from standing.

The policy of engaging countries like Libya and Iran is also the official policy of the EU. The day Tony Blair was meeting the Libyan foreign Minister , Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister was meeting Gaddafi. Given that US President facing a re-election it is expected that the Britain and the EU will increase their efforts to underscore the benefits of engagement as opposed to the policy of regime change favoured by Bush. By doing so they hope to restrict the theatre of American policy within the remit of international law, which also gives them a chance to compete with America.

February 11, 2004