Libyan opposition leader coming to Washington next week
Libyan Transitional National Council (TNC) Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril is coming to Washington on May 12, about a month after he postponed his previously planned visit due to a cancelled flight. The opposition’s official representative in Washington, former Libyan Ambassador Ali Aujali, announced the visit on Thursday, and said Jibril will meet with administration officials, ...
Libyan Transitional National Council (TNC) Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril is coming to Washington on May 12, about a month after he postponed his previously planned visit due to a cancelled flight.
The opposition’s official representative in Washington, former Libyan Ambassador Ali Aujali, announced the visit on Thursday, and said Jibril will meet with administration officials, lawmakers, and give a speech at the Brookings Institution. During his previously scheduled trip, he had planned to speak at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
"We are deeply grateful to the US for its diplomatic leadership, military support, and humanitarian assistance in the fight against the Qaddafi regime," said Ajuli in a statement. "During his visit, Dr. Jibril will help to fill out the picture and the plans of the opposition and its leadership in its efforts to establish a free and democratic Libya."
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will be out of town for Jibril’s visit, on an official visit to Greenland. But she met with Jibril today on the sidelines of the Libya Contact Group’s second round of meetings in Rome.
Before the meeting, Clinton announced that the United States would seek to give some of Libyan leader Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi’s frozen assets to the opposition.
"I’m pleased to announce that the Obama administration, working with Congress, has decided to pursue legislation that would enable the U.S. to tap some portion of those assets owned by Qaddafi and the Libyan government in the United States, so we can make those funds available to help the Libyan people," she said.
Clinton also said that Qaddafi must relinquish power, and promised that the NATO-led coalition would not stop striking his military until he stops killing his own citizens.
The Obama administration has been gradually ramping up its support for the Libyan opposition. The White House approved $25 million in non-lethal aid to the rebels on April 26. But the State Department has yet to abandon its official recognition of Qaddafi’s regime and recognize the TNC as the legitimate representative of the Libyan people.
As part of Jibril’s ongoing plea for aid, he promised that all Libyan government contracts would be honored by a new government led by the TNC.
Clinton said there were many ways to help the rebels, but didn’t get into specifics. "We’ll be discussing a financial mechanism, we’ll be discussing other forms of aid," she said.
Josh Rogin covers national security and foreign policy and writes the daily Web column The Cable. His column appears bi-weekly in the print edition of The Washington Post. He can be reached for comments or tips at josh.rogin@foreignpolicy.com.
Previously, Josh covered defense and foreign policy as a staff writer for Congressional Quarterly, writing extensively on Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay, U.S.-Asia relations, defense budgeting and appropriations, and the defense lobbying and contracting industries. Prior to that, he covered military modernization, cyber warfare, space, and missile defense for Federal Computer Week Magazine. He has also served as Pentagon Staff Reporter for the Asahi Shimbun, Japan's leading daily newspaper, in its Washington, D.C., bureau, where he reported on U.S.-Japan relations, Chinese military modernization, the North Korean nuclear crisis, and more.
A graduate of George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs, Josh lived in Yokohama, Japan, and studied at Tokyo's Sophia University. He speaks conversational Japanese and has reported from the region. He has also worked at the House International Relations Committee, the Embassy of Japan, and the Brookings Institution.
Josh's reporting has been featured on CNN, MSNBC, C-Span, CBS, ABC, NPR, WTOP, and several other outlets. He was a 2008-2009 National Press Foundation's Paul Miller Washington Reporting Fellow, 2009 military reporting fellow with the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism and the 2011 recipient of the InterAction Award for Excellence in International Reporting. He hails from Philadelphia and lives in Washington, D.C. Twitter: @joshrogin
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