Libya: The partition begins

When Nato murdered Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in cold blood, observers predicted that his demise would not mark the end of the war but would in fact mark its escalation.

Libya has been in the eye of a storm but now the winds are blowing again. The re-taking of Ben Walid by Gaddafi loyalists and the recent declaration of autonomy by tribal and militia leaders in oil-rich eastern Libya, are just harbingers of the strife to come.

While the NATO-installed head of the Tripoli-based National Transitional Council has threatened the use of “force” to prevent the country’s partition along regional lines, his words are bound to fall on deaf ears for the simple reason that he does not have the authority to back his words. He is just a Western mannequin.

In fact many members of the NTC do not move freely around Libya, with many reported to be sleeping in Malta, across the Mediterranean for fear of reprisals.

Nearly five months after the lynch-mob murder of Libya’s former leader, Muammar Gaddafi, and Nato’s declaration of victory in its war for regime change, the confrontation between Tripoli and Benghazi, the eastern city where the autonomy decision was taken, raises the spectre of civil war.

In a televised address on Wednesday from the city of Misrata, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the chairman of the NTC, categorically rejected the autonomy bid.

“We are not prepared to divide Libya,” he said. “They should know that there are infiltrators and remnants of the Gaddafi regime trying to exploit them now and we are ready to deter them, even with force.” Read More