Laundering Libya's image?
UNITED NATIONS Ñ Libya may be willing to pay compensation to families of Pan Am flight #103 victims in exchange for the US government and the UN dropping economic sanctions stemming from the Tripoli regimeÕs involvement in the 1988 terrorist bombing of the airliner. Headlines heralded the apparent settlement, a deal between lawyers representing the families who lost loved ones, and Libya ÒintermediariesÓ comes down to $10 million payments per family Ñ the money coming after sanctions are lifted on the North African country and Libya is removed form the US State DepartmentÕs terrorist sponsor list.
But political rehabilitation for Col. Muammar GadaffiÕs Libyan Arab Jamahiriya appears quite conditional for all sides. Moreover, any moves towards lifting sanctions on LibyaÕs loathsome regime must be methodical and complete. In other words conditions imposed by the UN; namely adequate compensation for the victims as well as LibyaÕs acceptance of responsibility, disclosures of information, and a renunciation of terror as a state option, must be met.
According to details of the agreement, Libya would pay 40 percent upon the lifting of UN sanctions, another 40% after the lifting of US sanctions with the last 20 percent installment coming when the State Department removes LibyaÕs name from the list of terrorist states. The percentages seem reasonable until you realize that weÕre talking about a case of pre-mediated state sponsored terrorism against an American airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland in which 270 people perished.
We are not, after all, bargaining for a rug here and thus LibyaÕs seemingly generous flexibility is more grotesque than anything. For Libya to argue when the UN drops sanctions (already suspended in 1999) we give you forty percent, and then good suffering families you must wait for the additional 40 percent because Washington has not dropped sanctions, and yes that other 20 percent is on hold too, since your government does not want to smoke the peace pipe.
Enter the spin-meisters and the moral equivalence crowd who would soon blame Washington for Òholding the grieving families of Pan Am 103 hostage to just compensation.Ó
Last August, President Bush signed a five-year extension of economic sanctions on Libya and Islamic Iran after strong pressures from both houses of Congress.
Why is the mercurial Col. Gadaffi, denizen of the Western Desert, willing to settle now for a crime which he claims he did not commit? George W. Bush.
Given the ongoing War on Terror, the last thing the Tripoli regime needs is to foolishly provoke the US Ñ or gain admission to the Axis of Evil. An American knockout punch on Col. GadaffiÕs desert kingdom would be militarily simple, politically popular, and, may I say, quite tempting to those who want to eschew the more tortuous road to Baghdad. While once the patron saint of terrorism, in recent years Gadaffi has toned down his revolutionary rhetoric and been on relatively good behavior; he even condemned the terrorist attacks of September 11th.
Oil companies doing business in Libya are particular proponents of a softer line towards Tripoli; six European firms are already pumping petroleum from under the Western Desert. Also too, the prospects of a tourist industry are enough to make Libya less bellicose.
Naturally for Libya any settlement for Pan Am 103 would immediately re-focus attention on yet another 1989 bombing of a French UTA airliner over Africa. Any deal with the Lockerbie victims would certainly set the legal precedent for prompt and equal justice for 170 French victims of the UTA disaster.
A statement by New YorkÕs Kreindler law firm representing the victimÕs families puts the matter into poignant focus, ÒIt is the first time that any of the states designated as sponsors of terrorism have offered compensation to the families of terror victims.Ó
LibyaÕs best attempts at political rehabilitation must go beyond financial compensation for the Lockerbie victims but also come clean on the past and renounce terrorism as an option in the future. Until then, sanctions should stay in place.
John J. Metzler is a U.N. correspondent covering diplomatic and defense
issues. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.
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