London Summit Doesn’t Rule Out Exile for Gadhafi
THE GLOBE AND MAIL: Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi may be offered a way out, even as the more than 40 nations gathered in London vowed to keep bombing his battered forces into submission.

The tough talk of relentless pressure aimed to oust the unpredictable and brutal despot who has ruled Libya for 41 years didn’t entirely drown out hints of possible exile and the possibility of avoiding a war crimes trial, with UN envoy Abdel-Elah Al-Khatib was headed to Tripoli.

Col. Gadhafi and his sons have so far vowed to fight to the death and unleashed a new salvo of furious accusations at what he calls Western “Crusaders.”

Still the possibility of exile remained.

“It depends on the country which may offer to welcome Gadhafi,” Italy’s Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said.

American, British and Canadian warplanes are flying bombing runs from Italian airbases, but the government in Rome remains fearful that a prolonged civil war or Col. Gadhafi regaining the military advantage would threaten Italy with a flood of hundreds of thousands of Libyan refugees.

Mr. Frattini, said “no country” has yet offered the Libyan leader exile, “even the African countries which may be ready” to consider it. Africa’s other pariah despot, Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, may be Col. Gadhafi’s best hope for a comfortable exile on the continent. Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez, another Col. Gadhafi admirer, might also offer the Libyan leader safe haven. » | Paul Koring | Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Inside Story: Libya's End Game
Inside Story presenter Kamahl Santamaria, discusses with Oliver Miles, a former British ambassdor to Libya; Mustafa Alani, director of the Security Progamme at the Gulf Research Centre and Aly Abuzaakouk, president of the Libyan Human and Political Development Forum

Church Blames Liberalism for Deepening Social Gap in Russia
RUSSIA TODAY: The Russian Orthodox Church has come up with its view of the current situation in the country. According to its report, many of the problems Russia is facing are rooted in alien liberal values.

­The document called “Tranfiguration and Modernization: Spiritual Basics, Aims, Risks and Chances” was presented during a meeting of the Economy and Ethics council curated by Patriarch Kirill, Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper reports. The authors are concerned about the fact that “in the background of official optimistic rhetoric, protest mood is growing in the country”. They quote statistics which suggest that the number of “discontented Russians ready to take part in protest rallies is nearing half of the population”.



Going deeper into the reasons for the current state of the country, the authors conclude that the problem is in liberal ideas which became popular in the 1990s. They put most blame on individualism, consumerism, and the cult of money. In their opinion, this “implies the liberation of a sinful personality” who is given the right to discharge everything that limits him or her in self-accomplishment, including moral values. In this perspective, liberal values are completely opposite to Christianity. » | Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Russia’s Most-wanted Terrorist Reportedly Killed in Air Strike

Verbunden »

Eleven More Opposition Members Quit Bahrain Parliament
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES: The parliament of Bahrain has accepted the resignations of eleven Shia opposition politicians, thereby widening the gulf between the Sunni ruling elite and the largely Shia protest movement in the tiny kingdom.

The state-controlled Bahrain News Agency reported that eleven members of the opposition Al Wefaq party quit to protest the government’s violent crackdown on protesters. Seven other Wefaq officials had previously quit over the same grievance.

Al Wefac, which has refused to enter into any dialogue with the ruling family, is the largest and most prominent of Bahrain’s seven opposition parties. » | Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Qatar Becomes First Arab Country to Recognize Libyan Rebels
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS TIMES: The tiny Persian Gulf state of Qatar has become the first Arab nation to recognize the rebels of Libya as representing that country’s legitimate ruling body.

The announcement comes following an oil marketing contract between the Benghazi-based rebels and Qatar.

Reportedly, the Qatar Petroleum company agreed to market crude oil produced from oil fields in eastern Libya, which are now firmly under rebel control.

"We contacted the oil company of Qatar and thankfully they agreed to take all the oil that we wish to export and market this oil for us," said Ali Tarhouni, a rebel official in charge of economic, financial and oil matters, according to media reports.

"Our next shipment will be in less than a week," he said, speaking from the rebel-held city of Benghazi. » | Monday, March 28, 2011

Egypt’s Fundamentalist Salafists Rise in Wake of Mubarak’s Fall
THE WASHINGTON POST: DUBANAH AL-KABIRAH, Egypt — The Egyptian revolution has brightened the future for many of the 3,000 people in this dusty farming village. Bribery has diminished at city hall, police have stopped harassing peasants and city-slicker businessmen can no longer buy their way into juicy land deals.

But perhaps the most obvious winners are the scowling men in long, black beards. They are the Salafists, Islamic fundamentalists who would like to see the strictest form of Islam applied to the way people live in Dubanah al-Kabirah, all of Egypt and across the Middle East.

Under President Hosni Mubarak, thousands were jailed indefinitely without trial or charges, part of Mubarak’s campaign to prevent Egypt from heeding the call to jihad from Osama bin Laden and his al-Qaeda underground. That left most of the traditionally easygoing Muslims of Dubanah al-Kabirah free to practice the conservative but tolerant strain of Islam for which Egypt has long been known.

But since Mubarak fell Feb. 11, many Salafists held for years without a legal basis have been released, here and across the country. In Dubanah al-Kabirah, they have returned home, and the most aggressive of them are seeking to impose their radical views with a boldness they would never have dared exhibit in Mubarak’s days.

Dubanah al-Kabirah, near the Nile about 70 miles south of Cairo, is just one tiny village in a nation of 80 million people and an Arab region of 340 million. But what is happening here is a cautionary tale about the unforeseeable consequences of nearly all the political uprisings that have exploded across the Middle East since December.

The youthful protesters who occupied Cairo’s Tahrir Square demanded genuine Western-style democracy, a goal applauded in Washington and around the world. The generals who took over from Mubarak have promised that goal will be reached eventually. But Mubarak’s departure set in motion a process that could change Egypt in many other ways as well, ways that Washington would find harder to applaud. » | Edward Cody | Friday, March 25, 2011

The US Honours Lebanese Writer Ameen Rihani
The first Arab-American writer to have an English language book published in the US is remembered

Nancy Soderberg Speaks to Al Jazeera
Nancy Soderberg, a former US ambassador to the United Nations, says the United States may consider providing "defensive weapons" to anti-Gaddafi fighters in Libya - but doing so "quietly". She tells Al Jazeera that officials will always seek to further their strategic interests, but that the US did not create the armed rebel groups, and doesn't entirely know who they are.

Bahrain Security Accused of Excessive Force

Tensions Rise over Bahrain 'Land Grab'

Gaddafi Issues Defiant Challenge to Libya Conference in London
THE GUARDIAN: Libyan leader condemns 'crusader strategy' amid speculation that his foreign minister has defected

Muammar Gaddafi told the London conference discussing Libya's future without him that there was no room for compromise with the Benghazi-based rebels, whom he described bluntly as al-Qaida terrorists supported by Nato and representing no one.

Far from showing any sign of bending to demands from Barack Obama, David Cameron and other world leaders that he step down, Gaddafi issued a characteristically defiant challenge to what he called a "new crusader strategy or imperialist plan".

But three powerful explosions that shook Tripoli in mid-afternoon – apparently the first daylight attack in 10 days of UN-mandated air strikes – seemed to presage a possible escalation of the conflict. Libyan officials made no comment.

In another dramatic development, there was speculation that Gaddafi's foreign minister, Mousa Kousa, might have defected during a visit to Tunisia.

The Libyan leader warned that the UN-imposed no-fly zone would turn north Africa into "a second Afghanistan" in an extraordinary letter sent to the European Parliament, the US Congress and "the Europeans" meeting in London.

"Stop your barbaric and unjust offensive against Libya," he wrote. "Leave Libya for the Libyans. You are carrying out an operation to exterminate a peaceful people and destroy a developing country. We are united behind the leadership of the revolution, facing the terrorism of al-Qaida on the one hand and on the other hand terrorism by Nato, which now directly supports al-Qaida."

The full text shows the Libyan leader to be baffled by the ingratitude of the world towards him after years of rapprochement and utterly dismissive of concerns about the use of violence against his own people. » | Ian Black in Tripoli | Tuesday, March 29, 2011

West's Fears over Spectre of al-Qaeda among Rebels
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: It should come as no surprise to the West that intelligence officials have identified "flickers" of al-Qaeda among the Libyan rebels seeking to overthrow the regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.

Since widespread anti-government protests erupted in Libya last month Col Gaddafi has repeatedly claimed that al-Qaeda was actively involved in stirring up the unrest. At the start of the uprising he even made the bizarre claim that al-Qaeda had supplied Libyans with pills that induced them to revolt. "Our children have been manipulated by al-Qaeda," he declared.

Saif al-Islam, his second eldest son and heir apparent, has also made much of al-Qaeda's role in the revolt, warning the West that it has made a "terrible mistake" in backing the rebels. "Believe me, one day when you wake up, you will find that you support the wrong people," he said after French warplanes had bombed Libya's air defences. "You've made a terrible mistake."

While the Gaddafi regime has undoubtedly exaggerated the extent of al-Qaeda's influence in their country, there is nevertheless disturbing evidence that the Islamist terror group is seeking to turn the current political unrest to its advantage.

The Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, a militant Islamist group committed to the establishment of a fundamentalist Islamic state in Libya, was set up in 1995 by groups of Libyan jihadi fighters who had returned home after fighting with the Mujahideen in Afghanistan against the Soviet Union.

The LIFG later established ties with like-minded organisations, particularly al-Qaeda's North African wing, which is predominantly based in Algeria and has claimed responsibility for a number of terrorist attacks against European targets. » | Con Coughlin | Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Libya: Al-Qaeda among Libya Rebels, Nato Chief Fears
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: Libyan rebel forces may have been infiltrated by al-Qaeda fighters, a senior American military commander has warned.

Admiral James Stavridis, Nato's Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, said that American intelligence had picked up "flickers" of terrorist activity among the rebel groups. Senior British government figures described the comment as "very alarming".

The admission came as the American, Qatari and British Governments indicated that they were considering arming rebel groups, who yesterday suffered a series of setbacks in their advance along the Libyan coast towards Tripoli.

The plan is likely to spark further splits in the international coalition, with Nato and Italian sources indicating the move would require another United Nations resolution.

On Tuesday more than 40 ministers from around the world met at a conference in London to discuss the situation in Libya.

They agreed to establish formal links with opposition groups in the rebel-stronghold of Benghazi with several countries sending official envoys to the area. Libyan opposition leaders yesterday also travelled to Britain for talks with David Cameron and Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State. (+ video) » | Robert Winnett, and Duncan Gardham | Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Gaddafi Must Go: Cameron
David Cameron, the British prime minister, says that Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, has lost legitimacy to lead his country and that he "must go". Cameron was speaking to Al Jazeera during an exclusive interview on the sidelines of a London summit on the crisis in Libya

World Leaders Say Gaddafi Must Go
The United Kingdom has hosted a summit on the developing situation in Libya, with leaders from forty countries saying that Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, must leave the country. The British hosts of the summit said that they did not discuss arming the rebels, even though the French foreign minister said it was a subject that his government was prepared to bring up. What the UN, NATO, Arab League and government representatives did agree to, however, was to establish a "contact group" to coordinate all international action on Libya. Al Jazeera's Paul Brennan reports from London

How refreshing it would be if these people were to be less hypocritical and more even-handed! Why is it more acceptable for the Bahraini élite to brutalise their own people, whereas it is totally unacceptable for the Libyan régime to do so? – © Mark

THE TIMES: Obama’s words won’t move Gaddafi » | Analysis | Giles Whittell, Washington | Tuesday, March 29, 2011 [£]

THE TIMES: Gaddafi son ‘killed by suicide bomber’ appears ‘live’ on Libyan TV » | Philippe Naughton | Tuesday, March 29, 2011 [£]

Portugal and Greece Downgraded on Debt Worries
BBC: Ratings agency Standard & Poor's has downgraded struggling Greece and Portugal on further debt worries.

S&P says investors in their bonds could lose out under the terms of a new eurozone bail-out package.

The move pushed up the countries' borrowing costs as lenders demanded a higher rate of return for buying government bonds.

The downgrades left Portugal one notch above junk rating and Greece's creditworthiness below that of Egypt. » | Tuesday, March 29, 2011

French Muslim Leader Calls for Protest
Mar 29 - A former top aide to French President Nicolas Sarkozy calls on Muslims to wear a green badge in protest against a government he claims stigmatizes the Islamic population. Nick Rowlands reports

SAPHIR NEWS: Les musulmans appelés à porter une « étoile verte » » | Rédigé par La Rédaction, Saphirnews.com | Lundi 28 Mars 2011

Japan: Nuclear Crisis "Very Serious"
Mar 29 - Plutonium found in soil near Japan's nuclear plant; Tokyo denies it's considering nationalizing plant operator TEPCO. Toshi Maeda reports

Libyan Rebels Retreat from Bin Jawad
Forces loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi have forced opposition fighters to abandon the town of Bin Jawad, a day after they had taken it, and retreat further east to Ras Lanuf

Empire - Information Wars
Information is power and in the age of the information revolution, cyber and satellite communication is transforming our lives, reinventing the relationship between people and power. How will governments deal with the information revolution?