Will Libya be partitioned? — II

Qaddafi cannot go into exile, nor will his sons be spared punishment that was meted out to Slobodan Milosevic by ICC.

So the question to ask, then is, can there be a peaceful resolution? Apart from Muammar Qaddafi’s letters to President Obama, other efforts have been made by Qaddafi and his family to reach a negotiated settlement, but at the heart of these efforts lies the demand that Qaddafi, or one of his sons, must remain the titular head of Libya. And this, the US and others appear unwilling to countenance, as made apparent in frequent statements from virtually every capital.

But the truth is that by passing UN Security resolution 1970, calling for a reference to the International Criminal Court (ICC) of the atrocities committed by Qaddafi and his cohorts since the uprising commenced on February 15, the powers that be have left Qaddafi with little choice. He cannot go into exile peacefully, nor will his sons be spared the sort of punishment that was meted out by the court to Slobodan Milosevic, the butcher of Yugoslavia.

The defecting foreign minister, Moussa Koussa, now in the hands of the British, has been given back the assets that had been frozen by the US, but it has also been stated that he will enjoy no immunity for the charges pending against him, with regard to the Lockerbie bombing, or even the current uprising. The Americans are hoping for more defections from Qaddafi’s ranks, but if these close aides are faced with the prospect of trials in the ICC, they have little incentive to do anything other than fight on alongside Qaddafi.

If the Americans and other powers want Qaddafi and his cohorts to read the writing on the wall and to step aside, they must give them an opportunity to escape. I have no doubt that was Qaddafi to be offered immunity from prosecution for himself and his aides, he would unhappily, or otherwise, choose to go into exile.

It this is not done, I fear that a de facto partition of the country will come about and the Libyans will face a protracted civil war. Whatever Qaddafi’s crimes, this is not the punishment the Libyan people deserve, nor is it the punishment that anyone seems to be insisting upon for the deposed Mubarak of Egypt, whose crimes against the Egyptian people are probably easily documented by the files of the dreaded security agencies.

Let us also be clear that, while at this time the revolution is largely led by secular forces, other examples from the Muslim world show that in the case of protracted conflict, those who will emerge, and perhaps dominate, are the Islamist extremists that Qaddafi keeps warning the West about.



Published in The Express Tribune, April 9^th, 2011.