Category Archives: Middle-East

Gaddafi, Hitler, Saddam … no self-respecting dictator can bear to be without a bunker. But however much gold you take with you, is life really worth living deep underground?The ruins of Bab al-Azizia, Colonel Gaddafi’s “Splendid Gate”, are as vast and as provocative as anything left by the many kings, emperors and dictators who have disgraced the pages of world history. The smashed three-metre-thick olive-green walls of the former Libyan leader’s compound stretch for miles on the western fringes of Tripol…

Western leaders have backed the Libyan rebels in their attempt to oust the dictatorGary Barker…

British diplomats seek to unblock £12bn worth of assets held in UK, including notes printed for Gaddafi regimeBritish diplomats are seeking the release of around £1bn worth of Libyan dinars which were printed in the UK but blocked from leaving the country in March.The banknotes were printed by British currency printer De La Rue for delivery to the Gaddafi regime but were not delivered after the UN froze Libya’s assets.The UK also wants to unblock some of the £12bn worth of assets which Libya held in the…

His followers survival as an armed faction in a future Libya would be disastrous, but is improbableAs the Nato battering ram opens up breaches for the Libyan rebels in Tripoli and Sirte, it is hard not to feel some pity for the men trying to bar their way. Spear carriers in a drama in which Muammar Gaddafi still sees himself as a resistance hero and a martyr, many will now pay a high price for his terminal self-delusion.How far their leader fell away from the ideals which first inspired him can be read both…

With Tripoli’s hospitals now in rebel hands, Gaddafi’s wounded loyalists admit the truth at lastIn three darkened rooms at the back of a Tripoli hospital, Gaddafi’s wounded lay awaiting their fate.Some writhed in agony, steel pins holding together their shattered bones; some lay, mummy-like, in bandages and plaster. Others shrouded themselves in olive-green blankets – shutting out the world. All 93 of the men in Mitiga hospital had a story to tell and some felt the time to speak openly had finally come.”I…

All dictators know that the biggest threat to their power is ridicule. And now the people of Libya are laughingDid you see that gold mermaid sofa which belonged to Colonel Gaddafi’s daughter? To adapt George Orwell’s famous observations on the goosestep, a gold mermaid sofa is only possible in countries where the common people dare not laugh at the army. “Its ugliness is part of its essence,” Orwell went on of the preposterous high kick, in words which might just as easily be applied to that gilded monster…

Gaddafi’s whereabouts remain a mystery but in Tripoli, the masses want two things: retribution and democracyThe mood was festive. The crowd included women in hijabs wearing rebel shawls, an elderly man in a dapper suit and a group of traffic policemen sporting their white, colonial-style uniforms. After Friday prayers several hundred people poured out on to the marble steps of the Darul al-Islamiah, Tripoli’s biggest mosque.And then the chanting began. First: “God is great.” Next: “Death to Gaddafi.” Then:…