Free Republic

Condoleezza Rice last night became the most senior US official to visit Libya in more than half a century when she arrived for a meeting with its leader, Muammar Gadafy. The visit, which Rice described as historic, was a reward for Gadafy's strategic decision over the past seven years to distance himself from extremism and give up weapons of mass destruction, providing a positive example to Iran.

President Muammar Gadafy yesterday embarrassed his latest high-profile western visitor, the German chancellor Gerhard Schröder, by demanding compensation for thousands of landmines left in the Libyan desert during the second world war. During talks in Tripoli, Mr Gadafy complained that dozens of Libyans were still being injured and killed by the anti-tank mines, which were buried by Erwin Rommel and his retreating army more than 60 years ago.

So "brave" Muammar Gadafy has agreed on the importance of combating terrorism. A handshake with Tony Blair has sealed his re-entry into the international community, with contracts worth several hundred million pounds for Shell and BAE to follow. His compliance in opening up Libya to nuclear weapons inspectors has been spun as a major triumph in the "war on terror". The motives, however, are rather more cynical. Negotiations for a rehabilitated public image for Colonel Gadafy, linked to improved western access to Libyan oil, began to surface in August 2002 with the visit by the Foreign Office minister, Mike O'Brien,...

UK firms line up big Libya deals Blair praises Gadafy's courage ahead of historic visit Nicholas Watt in Lisbon Thursday March 25, 2004 The Guardian Tony Blair will today pave the way for blue chip British companies to cash in on Libya's multibillion pound defence and oil industries when he pays a historic visit to the former pariah, Colonel Muammar Gadafy, in his tent on the outskirts of Tripoli. Within days of today's meeting, which will mark the symbolic ending of three decades of isolation for Tripoli, the oil giant Shell is expected to sign an agreement to allow it...

Tony Blair is ready to hold a historic meeting with Muammar Gadafy to offer his thanks to the Libyan leader for agreeing to dismantle his country's weapons of mass destruction programme, it has emerged. However, as Britain pledged to bring Libya "into the mainstream of the international community", Downing Street was given a blunt taste of the continuing threat of banned weapons when Syria declared that it has the right to develop WMD. In his first British interview since Col Gadafy's surprise announcement last month, the Syrian president insisted that Damascus would retain the right to develop banned weapons as...