Conflicting reports on Qaddafi’s death; NATO to discuss end to operation

Conflicting reports on Qaddafi’s death; NATO to discuss end to operation

The Libyan National Transitional Council will delay the burial of Muammar al-Qaddafi awaiting investigations into his death. There were many conflicting reports in the sequencing of events leading the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights to question the legality of Qaddafi’s killing as footage shows him alive at capture. NATO representatives will meet today to discuss an end to their seven month long air campaign. After the death of Muammar al-Qaddafi, NATO’s Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said the end of the mission “has now moved much closer.” British Defense Secretary Phillip Hammond told BBC “once we are satisfied that there is no further threat to the Libyan civilians and the Libyans are content NATO will then arrange to wind up the operation.”

Headlines  

• In response to deadly PKK attacks, Turkey deployed 10,000 troops into the Kurdish semi-autonomous region of northern Iraq and has vowed to collaborate with Iran in the fight.
• Campaigning ends at midnight for Sunday’s election for Tunisia’s constituent assembly slated to rewrite the constitution and appoint a president.
• A U.S. grand jury indicted two suspects of an alleged Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador meanwhile the U.S. denies Iranian reports of opposition responsibility.
• The identity of a Syrian activist “Alexander Page” who reported events in Syria to international media has been discovered by the regime forcing him to flee to Cairo.

Daily Snapshot

An Iraqi man holds a drawing of the new Libyan flag during the weekly protest in Baghdad’s Al-Tahrir square on October 21, 2011 a day after Libyan strongman Moamer Kadhafi was killed in his hometown of Sirte. Writing in Arabic reads: ‘Libyan people deserve respect.’ (ALI AL-SAADI/AFP/Getty Images). 

Arguments & Analysis

‘Qaddafi’s end, the Mideast’s future’ (Hamid, Qassemi et al., New York Times — Room for Debate)

Shadi Hamid:

Libya, then, may be the exception that proves the rule. If they have the stomach for it, brutal dictators can still get away with murder. The Arab spring hasn’t altered that sad and sobering reality. This was billed as the era of nonviolent change. But that narrative looks likely to be eclipsed by one that is much messier and morally ambiguous. Qaddafi, after all, never did get his trial. But I doubt that’s what is on the minds of most Libyans today.

Sultan Sooud al-Qassemi:

The National Transitional Council, after a series of delays and missteps today lacks credibility in the eyes of many in Libya and among the international community. Some of its members were closely affiliated with the previous regime for decades, others who raised their families in exile are seen to not have much in common with Libyans who have had to struggle under Qaddafi. Those controversial figures should resign their posts. Will this week be remembered as the day Libya started its descent into a new civil war or the day in which a bright new page was turned in this North African country’s history?

‘The death of the Qaddafi generation’ (Mohamad Bazzi, Foreign Affairs)

“Until the end, Qaddafi kept up the pretense that he was no more than a guide for the nation. In a televised speech in late February, soon after the Libyan uprising began, he spoke of himself in the third person, vowing to stand fast. “Muammar Qaddafi has no official post so that he can pout and resign from it, like other presidents did! Muammar Qaddafi is not a president! He is the leader of the revolution until the end of time!” he bellowed, pounding the lectern. Then he lapsed into the first person: “I am greater than the positions held by presidents and notables. I am a fighter. A mujahid. A revolutionary from the tent.” Unfortunately for him and for Libya, he betrayed his own revolution, just as the other strongmen of his generation had. With Qaddafi’s death, the burden now falls on the newest revolutionaries to do better at securing Arab aspirations.” 

‘Tunisia’s election: the Islamist conundrum’ (The Economist)

“In any event, Nahda is tugged in different directions by its largely moderate leadership and its more conservative rank and file. Its president, Rachid Ghannouchi, has reiterated that his party seeks to be merely one political force in a multi-party democracy. It has gone further than its rivals in proposing to water down the powers of the presidency, advocating a constitution that it says would follow the German or British systems in giving most executive powers to a prime minister. Some people from the old regime who still haunt the interior ministry are looking to the myriad of small parties and independent lists that emerged from the RCD’s dissolution to regroup and prevent domination of the assembly by their old adversaries, the Islamists. But even this old guard has in recent months adopted the vocabulary of “democratic transition”, however opportunistically.”

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