Global Policy Forum

By Thalif Deen

The lifting of the 11-year-old UN economic and military embargo on Libya - one of North Africa's richest oil-producing nations - paves the way for a mad scramble by arms suppliers to capture the multibillion-dollar market in that country. ''Libya was one of the world's most sought-after arms markets before it came under sanctions,'' says Michael Khatana of Research and Projections Global Inc., a U.S.-based company that tracks weapons sales and collects military data worldwide. ''With the end to UN sanctions, the Russians, the Eastern Europeans, the Italians and the Britishers should be back in the market soon,'' he told IPS.

Even before the UN Security Council lifted its sanctions last week, the Libyan government began negotiations with Italy to purchase communications systems, fast patrol boats and night vision technology. Just before Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi took over the rotating six-month presidency of the European Union (EU) July 1, the EU warned Italy that the proposed sale would violate UN and EU military sanctions imposed on Libya. But the Italians argued that the ''dual-use equipment'' was for civilian use, particularly to help Libya stop the flow of illegal immigrants from North Africa to Italy.

On Wednesday (September 17), Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar was the first western leader to meet Libyan leader Muammar el-Qaddafi in post-sanctions Tripoli, less than a week after the U.N. embargo was lifted. Spain said the two countries would sign several new agreements covering oil, electricity, industry and agriculture. The communiqué did not mention weapons sales, which, in most countries, are subject to ''non-disclosure'' agreements.

Late last year, the South African government denied rumours that it was planning to sell weapons to Libya because of a close personal relationship between Qaddafi and South African President Thabo Mbeki. Max Sisulu, deputy chief executive officer of South Africa's arms consortium Denel, was quoted as saying that his company would not sell arms to Libya until U.N. sanctions were lifted. According to Khatana, the U.S. State Department once described Libya as ''one of the world's most over-armed countries". According to U.S. intelligence sources, Libya has nearly 500 fighter aircrafts, jet trainers and military transports, he added.

Libya, which depends on oil for about 95 per cent of its export earnings and about 30 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP), earns between seven and 10 billion dollars annually from oil revenues. With a population of about 5.7 million, the nation spends over 1.5 billion dollars a year on its military budget. Global arms transfers range from about 26 to 40 billion dollars annually.

According to the Washington-based weekly, 'Defence News', the United States ranks number one, with about 12.1 billion dollars in arms sales, followed by Britain (6.1 billion), Russia (3.7 billion) Germany (3.2 billion) and France (2.9 billion dollars). All but Germany are veto-wielding permanent members of the UN Security Council. Armed with aging pre-sanctions military equipment, much of which has been grounded for lack of spares, Libya once had a formidable arsenal, including both French and Soviet fighter planes and combat helicopters, British, Italian and French fast patrol boats, Soviet submarines and missiles, and hundreds of Brazilian battle tanks and British armoured personnel carriers.

Tripoli was also known to dole out money and weapons to several ''liberation'' movements, including the Polisario in Western Sahara and Muslim separatists in Sulu-Mindanao in the Philippines. All that came to an end with UN and U.S. military sanctions. They have also prevented Libya from modernising its 76,000-strong military force, equipped mostly with weapons dating back to the 1970s.

Washington imposed its economic and military embargo in 1981, penalising Libya for fomenting international terrorism. It is one of seven countries on a State Department list of ''terrorist states.'' The 1992 UN embargo followed the December 1988 mid-air explosion of a Pan Am jet over Lockerbie, Scotland, which claimed the lives of 270 passengers. The Libyans were accused of complicity in that bombing.

The Security Council temporarily suspended some of those sanctions in 1999 after Libya fulfilled one demand by transferring the two Libyan suspects for a trial before a Scottish court in the Netherlands. Libya has said that the combined sanctions have cost it over 25 billion dollars in trade, economic benefits and revenues over the last 22 years.

A move to lift sanctions was stalled last month by French threats to veto the resolution. Paris had been seeking increased compensation from Libya for the downing of a French aircraft over Niger in 1989. The 15-member Security Council voted last Friday to lift the sanctions after 13 countries voted in favour and two, the United States and France, abstained on the resolution. The decision to lift the UN embargo followed Libya's agreement to pay some 2.7 billion dollars in compensation to families of the 270 victims of the Pan Am bombing.

France dropped its opposition to the resolution after Tripoli agreed to increase payments to families of the 170 passengers who died when the French airliner exploded over the Niger desert. U.S. Ambassador James Cunningham told delegates that Washington continues to have ''serious concerns about other aspects of Libyan behaviour, including its poor human rights record, rejection of democratic norms and standards, its irresponsible behaviour in Africa, its history of involvement in terrorism -- and most important - its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their means of delivery''.

Cunningham said that Libya was actively pursuing a broad range of WMD, and well as seeking ballistic missiles. The U.S. envoy also accused Tripoli of ''actively developing biological and chemical weapons''. ''The United States will intensify its efforts to end Libya's threatening actions,'' Cunningham warned. ''This includes keeping U.S. bilateral sanctions on Libya in full force.'' Ambassador Jean-Marc de la Sabliere of France told the Security Council that the lifting of sanctions was an ''important phase'' in the process of re-integrating Libya into the international community. ''That normalisation presumed that Libya would continue to make the necessary gestures beyond the requirements for the lifting of sanctions,'' he added.

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