Tag Archives: libya

LibLink: Paddy Ashdown – Libya’s path to democracy

By Nick Thornsby | Published 27th October 2011 - 10:28 am

Lord (Paddy) Ashdown recently penned a piece for the Guardian with some thoughts on how Libya should now move towards a functioning democracy following its liberation. The rule of law, in the short term at least, is more important than elections, according to Paddy.

Here’s an extract:

If there is one thing more fraught, more attended by failure and more difficult to do than fighting a war, it is building the peace which follows. Our modern wars are fought in weeks or months – but building the peace is measured in decades. Wars are violent and swift. Building peace is long, painful

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Posted in Europe / International, LibLink | Also tagged | 2 Comments

Opinion: Gaddafi’s Death – a conflict of emotion

By Layla Moran | Published 26th October 2011 - 2:27 pm

As is customary in my family, any major news event (especially one in the Arab world) is first alerted to us by a text or call from my mother. While neither of my parents are party political, politics has permeated every hour of our family life for a long as I can remember. These days, usually as a result of either BBC World News or Al-Jazeera being the TV channel of choice at all times.

My father is currently operative as the EU head of ‘mission’ (in as much as one can exist) in Libya and so we have been watching …

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Posted in Europe / International, Op-eds | Also tagged | 5 Comments

What Lib Dem members think about the Libya military intervention and its aftermath

By Stephen Tall | Published 2nd October 2011 - 6:50 pm

Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of various political issues, the Coalition, and the performance of key party figures. Over 550 party members responded, and we’re continuing to publish the full results.

Lib Dem members backed Libya intervention… and two-thirds are optimistic for country’s future

LDV asked: Do you think Britain, France, the US and other countries were right or wrong to take military action in Libya?

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Posted in LDV Members poll | Also tagged | 3 Comments

MI6: speech-writers to Colonel Gaddafi?

By Mark Pack | Published 4th September 2011 - 8:49 am

Well, this is an unusual twist as the changes in Libya reveal documents about relations between foreign governments and Colonel Gaddafi:

The documents claim that MI6 supplied its counterparts in Libya with details on exiled opponents living in the UK, and chart how the CIA abducted several suspected militants before handing them over to Tripoli.

They also contain communications between British and Libyan security officials ahead of Tony Blair’s visit in 2004, and show that British officials helped write a draft speech for Gaddafi when he was

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Posted in News | Also tagged , | 2 Comments

Nick Clegg: Learning the lesson of Iraq, planning the peace

By Helen Duffett | Published 22nd August 2011 - 2:54 pm

Nick Clegg has given a speech on the Arab Spring today at the British Council. He also included a passage on last night’s dramatic events in Libya:

The advances made by the Free Libya Forces in Tripoli would have been unthinkable just a few months ago. Unimaginable, even, for the generations of young Libyans who have never known a world without Qadhafi. Now, that world is within their reach. The momentum for change is breathtaking and, for the cynics who said change wasn’t possible, who had written off the Libyan uprising, written off the Arab Spring, clearly, they were wrong. The

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Posted in News, Speeches | Also tagged , , , | 10 Comments

Nick Harvey MP writes: A hard look at defence spending

By Nick Harvey MP | Published 3rd August 2011 - 6:53 pm

Today the Commons defence committee published a report criticising the MOD for decisions taken in last year’s Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR).  The report claims that recent defence budget reductions will leave our Armed Forces unable to execute the operations the Government sets for them post-2015.  
 
I disagree.
 
It is true that the MOD is reducing numbers of service personnel across the Army, Navy and Air Force and indeed the MOD has altered the equipment programme, which led to the deletion of Nimrod and Harrier.  But these tough decisions were necessary in order to address the black hole in the …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , | 17 Comments

Opinion: Libya – Where now?

By John Russell | Published 30th June 2011 - 4:25 pm

In my second article on the Libyan conflict (read the first one here) I want to look at possible solutions and answers and creative ways that the international coalition can ensure that the war is brought to a quick and decisive conclusion.

The central problem is that Resolution 1973 is not up to the task at hand and either needs to be circumvented or rewritten. Without the right mandate it will be very difficult to win this war. Creative thinking and diplomacy are urgently required.

Supporting the Rebels
One hundred days in it is shocking that this amateur and brave army has …

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Posted in Op-eds | 11 Comments

Opinion: Libya – A conflict without a strategy?

By John Russell | Published 29th June 2011 - 4:25 pm

Monday marked 100 days since the air campaign began in Libya. Resolution 1973 authorises ‘all necessary measures to protect civilians’. The resolution, however, specifically excludes a foreign occupation force of any form on Libyan territory.

The White House was always lukewarm, at best, to the prospect of international intervention in Libya and has taken a back seat in the operation. As yet the combination of rebel forces and NATO air strikes has failed to have much significant strategic impact. Indeed, the Gaddafi regime seems intent on playing the long game and out lasting the unlikely combination of NATO airpower and weak …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , | 10 Comments

PMQs: Bits start to fall off Cameron’s wagon

By Paul Walter | Published 22nd June 2011 - 7:53 pm

After last week’s Miliband success at Prime Minister’s Questions, this time we started off with Ed Miliband in softly softly mode. He asked about Libya and the service chiefs’ concern about an extended campaign. Displaying a becoming measure of gravitas, he also asked whether the defence review should be revisited in the light of the “Arab Spring” which William Hague has described as more important than 9-11. That’s a good question given that the review didn’t mention Libya, Tunisia or Egypt.

David Cameron said he has been assured by the military grand fromage that we could keep the campaign going as …

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Posted in Parliament, PMQs | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

Lib Dem members survey: overwhelming backing for military action in Libya

By Stephen Tall | Published 26th April 2011 - 4:45 pm

Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of various political issues, the Coalition, and the performance of key party figures. Over 530 party members have responded, and we’re publishing the full results this week.

Seven-in-10 Lib Dems back coalition force, but members split on success of action


LDV asked: Do you think Britain, France, the US and other countries are right or wrong to take military action in Libya?

    73% – Right to take military action
    18% – Wrong to take military action
    9% – Don’t know / No opinion

LDV then asked: Overall do you …

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Posted in LDV Members poll | 7 Comments

Nick Clegg lays down five principles of intervention – but doesn’t explain the Ivory Coast

By Mark Pack | Published 31st March 2011 - 8:55 am

In a major foreign policy speech in Mexico this week, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg laid out five reasons why intervention in Libya was the right course to take and different from Iraq. However, applying those five reasons to the Ivory Coast raises the question why it is being treated so differently from Libya.

In his speech, Clegg said that Libya different from Iraq because:

First, the Libyan action is unambiguously legal. Iraq was not.

Second, there is a clear humanitarian case for intervention in Libya. In Iraq the case rested solely on the danger posed by weapons of mass destruction, a

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , , | 40 Comments

Opinion: Why Lib Dems should reject the doctrine of liberal interventionism

By David Thorpe | Published 26th March 2011 - 11:46 am

If the regular politics of coalition is a walk in a minefield, the Libya crisis presents Lib Dems with a walk in a minefield while being haunted by a pair of malevolent ghouls.

Those twin ghouls are ghosts of conflicts past, conflicts where Britain intervened and expedited disaster, such as Iraq , and the countries where the UK sat on its hands, and watched disaster unfold, such as in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

There are a number interesting, and from a Lib Dem point of view welcome, feature of the debate concerning the possibility of the western intervention in Libya, …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , | 42 Comments

Another 52 killed in the Ivory Coast

By Mark Pack | Published 25th March 2011 - 12:55 pm

With a depressing predictability, my post at the start of the week about how the Ivory Coast’s violent political tragedy is being largely ignored has been one of the least well read posts on The Voice during this week.

But The Voice’s readers are pretty typical of the wider world in this respect at least. Until the end of yesterday, for example, Libya had got 54 mentions in Parliament so far this year, the Ivory Coast only six.

Yet this week has been another bloody one as defeated President Gbagbo refuses to leave office. The UN says 52 more people were murdered …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , | 1 Comment

Libya intervention passed to NATO’s leadership

By Mark Pack | Published 25th March 2011 - 8:55 am

The BBC reports:

Nato has agreed to take command of enforcing the no-fly zone over Libya from the US.

But Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen made clear that other aspects of the operation would remain in the hands of the current coalition for now…

The US initially agreed to lead enforcement of the UN resolution, but made clear it wanted only a limited role and would hand over responsibility as soon as possible.

But the handover to Nato became bogged down when Turkey made clear its view that action should focus directly on enforcing the no-fly zone and arms embargo, rather than

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Posted in News | Also tagged , | 5 Comments

Parliament debates Libya: what Liberal Democrat MPs have been saying

By Mark Pack | Published 21st March 2011 - 8:45 pm

Here are some selections from today’s debate in Parliament so far on the United Nations resolution on Libya and subsequent military action which touch on the questions of international law, the Liberal Democrat position, what is happening in other countries and the question of Iraq:

Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD):In view of the obviously barbaric attacks by Gaddafi on his own people, does the Prime Minister agree that those officials and military chiefs who are still standing firm with Gaddafi stand every chance of being hauled before the war crimes tribunal?

The Prime Minister: The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point. The

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , , | 31 Comments