One Year On. (Part I) Why we attacked Libya. T.J. Coles. Axis of Logic

Editor's Note: We are pleased to publish this second installment on our series, "Libya: One Year On," by T.J. Coles. It is utterly important that the details of the 2011 US/Israeli/NATO destruction and continuing occupation of this peaceful country be documented for the historical record. While many examples exist of the old adage, "The victor writes the history," the "victor" no longer has control of the press as it once did. While they can continue to write their revisionisms (deceptions), the alternative media now has truth-to-power in producing permanent records of what has really happened in the imperialist barbarism executed against sovereign nations like Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya.

Humanity is indebted to T.J. Coles and other scholars for their pain-staking, exhaustive research and comprehensive coverage of these wars. The history being written today is not only in words but also in images. We include a few of them below and some are graphic.

The war crimes of the US, Israel and NATO in Libya are staggering and thus far have been carried out with impunity. But if this weary old planet survives their economic and environmental crimes, history will judge them, their decision-makers and the corporate cabal that funds their wars ... and without mercy.

- Les Blough, Editor

NATO war planes attacking Libya in Spring, 2011

A proud Nicolas Sarkozy ordered the French Air Force to lead the devastating aerial attack on Libya with Mirage jets from the Solenzara 126 Air Base on Corsica Island in the Mediterranean on March 24, 2011.

One of the thousands of NATO air strikes beginning in March, 2011. By October they repeated this bombing of Libyan cities and towns 9,300 times.

Tripole Street in Misrata before and after

Martyr Square, Tripoli, before and after the bombing

The city of Sirte, birthplace of Col. Qadaffi and the last stronghold of the Libyan Resistance was utterly destroyed by NATO bombing when thousands of people were killed, maimed and displaced.

By September, at least 13 mass graves had been found in Libya. ICRC spokesperson Steven Anderson said "more mass graves are being found every week". Unidentified bodies were exhumed for burial in unmarked graves. There were 12 different such sites in and around Tripoli according to the Geneva-based Red Cross.

To no avail the women of Misrata demonstrated in the streets against the NATO assault.

“There are mirrors Which should have wept with shame and horror” - Pablo Neruda

From at least August 2011 to the beginning of the coup, UK special forces secretly trained the anti-Gaddafi opposition on a farm in Libya.¹ Their SAS colleagues, who had previously trained Gaddafi’s forces,² were apparently so annoyed about the deception that they attempted to leak a 70-page document concerning the secret services’ role in dividing to conquer.³

The coup was first attempted in 1995 when MI6 wired £100,000 to the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group in order to provoke “orchestrated unrest in Benghazi ... The coup plotters expected to establish control of Libya at the end of March 1996 ... want[ing] rapprochement with the West.”⁴ It would appear that the botched effort succeeded in February 2011, when an armed uprising spread across the country.

After the failed coup of 1995-6, Gaddafi agreed in word but not in deed to economically liberalise the country for Western businesses.⁵ In anticipation that Gaddafi would renege on his pledge, European countries began mounting opposition groups. These included: the London-based Libyan Muslim Brotherhood; the London-based National Conference for the Libyan Opposition, led by Ibrahim Sahad of the National Front for the Salvation of Libya, another UK-based opposition group; the Manchester-based Libyan Constitutional Union; and the Germany-UK-based Libyan League for Human Rights.⁶

Just as the coup began in February 2011, Robin Lam, Director-general of the Libyan-British Business Council, which boasts a 150-company membership (including Shell, BP, Barclays and HSBC), wrote that:

Our contacts have always gone beyond the Qadhafi regime and include some of the key figures who are now forming the nucleus of an alternative government in Benghazi. Our contacts have enabled us to keep in direct touch with developments in Libya in the last two weeks and as soon as the dust settles, we plan an early visit to the country to engage and expand our network. … Lord Trefgarne will call on Lord Green of Hurstpierpoint, the Minister of Trade, to put the seal on this process.⁷

UK Elite Forces acknowledged that “Since the early days of the rebellion, British special forces, along with their French, Jordanian and Qatari counterparts have been arming, advising and training rebel forces,”⁸ in violation of Britain’s own UNSCR 1970. The rebels, and thus by proxy the UK, engaged in massive human rights abuses during the coup and NATO bombing.

Rebel War Crimes

Contrary to hysterical media lies about Gaddafi’s alleged plan to “ethnically cleanse” Benghazi,⁹ the UK-armed-and-trained rebels committed an actual ethnic cleansing of Sub-Saharan Libyans, sparking a major refugee crisis—the consequences of which they continue to suffer. The UN Human Rights Council’s Report of the International Commission of Inquiry in Libya reported a year after the NATO assault that the "Thuwar" (NATO mercenaries) committed serious violations, including war crimes and breaches of international human rights law, the latter continuing at the time of the present report. The Commission found these violations to include unlawful killing, arbitrary arrest, torture, enforced disappearance, indiscriminate attacks, and pillage. It found in particular that the Thuwar are targeting the Tawergha [black Libyans] and other communities.¹⁰

A year after the bombing, Amnesty reported that

The 30,000 residents of the town of Tawargha [the entire population], who were forcibly displaced during the conflict, are still barred from returning to their town, where their homes have been looted and burned down. They remain in poorly resourced camps in Benghazi, Tripoli and elsewhere in Libya and face an uncertain future.¹¹

The Western media were complicit in harming Sub-Saharan Africans. By accusing them of being “mercenaries” for the sole purpose of demonising Gaddafi, they were dehumanised in the minds of Western publics. In March 2011, Amnesty reported no evidence concerning Gaddafi’s use of mercenaries.¹² In 2012, Amnesty mentioned “suspected foreign “mercenaries” – most of whom were in fact migrant workers.”¹³ Conversely, the UK’s Olive Group is a mercenary company, and a member of the Libyan-British Business Council—a fact conveniently ignored by the media.¹⁴ In the Western media lexicon, UK mercenaries are “privative security contractors.”

By July 2011, 1.1 million Libyans had been affected by the bombing and coup, and “fighting in Nafousa, Zawia and Misrata ha[d] resulted in an acute humanitarian crisis in these areas. Secondly, there are growing tensions elsewhere as the effects of the sanctions are increasingly felt,” the World Health Organization reported. If we are to believe the lies about humanitarian intervention, the Western allied powers sanctioned Libya—putting 280,000 at risk of starvation—in order to save Libyans from Gaddafi. “[T]he continuing conflict is severely jeopardizing its ability to maintain health care services”, WHO reported. Despite this, NATO kept bombing and the SAS/MI6 continued to train and arm the rebels. “Recent assessments in Misratah and other parts of eastern Libya found that hospitals were overwhelmed, medical staff were exhausted, and supplies of essential drugs and medical supplies were running critically low.”¹⁵

UNICEF reported on 17 October that thirty schools had been damaged in Ajdabiya and Misrata alone. “Burnt out tanks, armoured cars and spent ammunition shells line the road between Benghazi and Ajdabiya, an apocalyptic landscape left by the battles that took place here.”¹⁶ Also in that month, the Red Cross reported that the organization “has been able to meet with representatives of civil society, who reported dire needs in terms of drinking water, food supplies – in particular baby food – and hygiene items.”¹⁷

A year after the bombing, “Tomina and Kararim are ghost towns because Misrata officials [of the Western-backed interim government] are blocking thousands of people who fled from returning home,” said Peter Bouckaert, emergencies director of Human Rights Watch.¹⁸

Amnesty reported that “torture is being carried out by officially recognized military and security entities as well by a multitude of armed militias operating outside any legal framework.”¹⁹ This should be of grave concern to UK taxpayers because “We are supporting the NTC’s own plans for political transition in Libya, through the Friends of Libya group and the allocation of up to £20.6m in UK funding”, the Foreign Office reported.²⁰

Children in Pieces

According to UNICEF, the West’s “humanitarian intervention” put 2 million Libyan children at risk of death, injury, illness, starvation, dehydration, and/or forced migration. Commenting on the Western media’s shameful omission of children during the coup and bombing, UNICEF noted in April 2011 the almost complete absence of children from images and reports out of the country. We didn’t see children, we didn’t hear from them and – much as we probed and queried – we simply didn’t know what was really happening to them. We do now, and it’s worse than we feared … We now know a little of their lives, because we have learned how they died. The youngest child to bear the brunt of the fighting in Misrata was reportedly nine months old, and most of those who died over the last two weeks were under the age of 10 … Many other children are traumatized by what they are going through. Many have limited access to essential daily needs, including water and food, and none are in school. Other children, like those in the city of Zintan, south-west of Tripoli, are completely cut off. Trapped amid the shooting and shelling, they may be experiencing a tragedy similar to the events in Misrata.²¹

A few of the many Libyan children killed by NATO governments.

Amanda Melville, a Child Protection Officer for UNICEF, “highlighted the tremendous emotional toll war takes on a child.” She noted that “Children are experiencing a range of different problems. I mean, most of them are related to feeling afraid.”²² A UNICEF reporter wrote that

The most obvious threats to children are the weapons around them. Landmines and explosive remnants of war contaminate areas around Misrata, Ajdabiya and the Nafusa Mountains … In some cases, the damage done to children by the conflict is not physical, but psychological. Many Libyan children who have been through traumatic experiences are now in urgent need of psycho-social support. Parents at two displacement camps I visited recently, near the coastal city of Al-Bayda, told me stories of their young children’s near-constant nightmares and insomnia. In Benghazi, a three-year-old girl at a children’s recreation club burst into tears because she thought the camera hanging from my shoulder was a gun.²³

What kind of adults would ever put children in that position? Presumably adults who were themselves badly affected in childhood and have yet to grow up—people like the SAS, MI6, Clinton, Obama, Sarkozy, Cameron, Clegg, and Hague.

Boat People

From late March to 1 December 2011, at least 1090 verifiable deaths of Libyan boat refugees fleeing across the Mediterranean to Europe were confirmed by the Western press. In reality, the figure is likely much higher. In many cases, the men, women, and children were turned away by the very European countries that trained and armed the rebels and initiated the bombing. The refugees were left to drown by NATO ships and aircraft, which stood by. The reason is simple, and was explained by numerous European think-tanks in the previous years: Europe does not want an influx of immigrants from North African countries.²⁴

As for NATO, the reason for its deliberate inaction is also simple: NATO’s self-appointed role is pipeline and resource “security”, not humanitarianism; the latter is a PR pretext.²⁵ Médecins Sans Frontières issued the following statement. The organization criticises inconsistent European policies claiming to protect civilians by engaging in a war while closing its borders to them … MSF draws attention to the discrepancy between the reception offered by Tunisia and Egypt – which have accepted nearly 630,000 people fleeing neighbouring Libya – and that provided by European states, which have turned back boat people – who are risking their lives to reach Europe – from their territorial lands and waters.²⁶

“Since the end of March [2011], two vessels sailing from Libya have disappeared -- one carrying 320 people and the other 160,” UPI quoted Laura Boldrini, spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (Italy), as saying.²⁷ Time magazine reported a group of 72 African [sic] migrants — men, women and a few children, from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan and Nigeria — drifting on the Mediterranean for 16 days in late March and early April … watched their stocks of water and cookies steadily dwindle. Those supplies had been dropped onto their boat, they said, by a helicopter marked “ARMY,” after its Ghanaian captain had phoned a refugee organization in Rome to send help. … Days later, survivors say, two helicopters lifted off from a nearby warship — believed by Guardian reporters to have been France’s Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier — and flew low over the refugee boat. The passengers held up the two babies onboard, to show the pilots the desperation of their plight. The pilots flew away. Then, as the boat drifted, its fuel tanks empty, the passengers began to die of starvation, one by one, until just 10 were left alive.

Ethiopian survivor Abu Kirke “said he survived by eating two tubes of toothpaste and drinking his own urine.” On 6 April, “about 250 people drowned when their boat sank off the Italian island of Lampedusa.”²⁸ Commenting on the previous disaster, the Guardian reported that “the boat encountered a number of European military units including a helicopter and an aircraft carrier after losing fuel and drifting, but no rescue attempt was made and most of the 72 people on board eventually died of thirst and hunger.”²⁹ CNN reported in May 2011 that “Hundreds -- possibly thousands -- of African migrants have drowned or disappeared at sea trying to flee Libya for Europe.”³⁰

Also in May, “The UN sa[id] almost all of the estimated 600 African migrants who were on board an overcrowded ship that sank off the Libyan coast are believed to have died,” the Associated Press reported. Between 25 March and 10 May alone “About 14,800 [refugees] have made the gruelling journey across the Mediterranean in rickety ships run by smugglers who rarely provide enough food and water. … At least 800 people had been lost at sea in three boat sinkings before the latest ship went down with 600 aboard off Tripoli”, AP reported.³¹ In June, the Socialist Worker reported that

Hundreds of refugees from Libya were left to drown by Nato ships … They say that their sinking vessel appealed for help from passing Nato and Italian ships, but none would stop. The United Nations (UN) says that more than 150 people died when a boat overloaded with 850 refugees fleeing Libya’s capital Tripoli sank in the Mediterranean [in late May-early June] … One man died after becoming so mad with hunger he ate his own shit. … Mothers and their children are often separated into different [Tunisian refugee] camps, not knowing if the other is even alive.³²

The Associated Press reported in August that

Twenty-five African migrants trying to reach Italy from Libya died in the hold of a rickety boat so packed with people that they could not get out as they struggled to breathe … The 15-metre boat was carrying 296 people, including women and children … As the air became unbreathable from exhaust fumes, migrants tried to exit but the boat was too packed for those standing above to move aside.³³

The Daily Mail reported in December 2011 that

Around 100 Libyan refugees are believed to have died after a boat carrying them got into difficulties off the Italian island of Lampedusa … Many were understood to have been badly dehydrated when they were found, while the Italian media reported that ‘dozens and dozens of people’ had died of thirst and hunger. … [Some 300 people, including pregnant women] had been crammed into the drifting 65ft boat for more than 36 hours.³⁴

Anglo-American-NATO War Crimes

The Shell, Statoil, Talisman Energy-sponsored International Crisis Group, chaired by such bastions of human rights as Turki al-Faisal, Shimon Peres and Zbigniew Brzezinksi, admitted that

Although the declared rationale of this intervention was to protect civilians, civilians are figuring in large numbers as victims of the war, both as casualties and refugees, while the leading Western governments supporting NATO’s campaign make no secret of the fact that their goal is regime change.

Contrary to media lies about immediate regime change, “To insist that he [Gaddafi] both leave the country and face trial in the International Criminal Court is virtually to ensure that he will stay in Libya to the bitter end and go down fighting”, the International Crisis Group observed (emphasis in original).³⁵ That was precisely the idea:

A Chatham House paper published in June 2011 acknowledged that the goal was not to protect civilians or to formally depose Gaddafi but “to maintain the status quo for several months to come … to deplete the regime’s resources.”³⁶ Once the country had been reduced to rubble (all the buildings in Sirte were damaged, for instance), the IMF and World Bank stepped in to reconstruct the country along Euro-American-approved lines.³⁷

According to its own records, NATO launched 9,700 “strike sorties”: 6,300 were military, meaning that NATO hit 3,400 civilian targets.³⁸ According to the UN’s human rights mission, on average 60 civilians died for every twenty strikes: approximately three civilians per strike.³⁹ If we multiply 3 by 9,700 divided by 20, it can be estimated that 1,455 civilians died as a result of NATO strikes, added to the 1,300 who reportedly died in a single NATO attack.⁴⁰

In total, NATO probably killed around 2,700 civilians by direct bombing (about the same number as NATO’s Serbian-Kosovar victims), and of course many more will die from the cancer and deformities caused by depleted uranium. In May 2011, Foreign Policy Journal’s Thomas C. Mountain reported that

NATO aircraft are routinely equipped with anti-armor missiles fitted with depleted uranium war heads. It has been widely reported that NATO has fired hundreds of anti-armor missiles in many parts of Libya, including in the immediate environs of the Libyan capital Tripoli. This means that thousands of kilos of depleted uranium have been used in Libya in the past weeks. … Irradiate the Libyan people to save the Libyan people? How else could you describe the NATO attack on Libya?⁴¹

On 30 April, Reuters reported that

Shattered glass litters the carpet at the Libyan Down’s Syndrome Society, and dust covers pictures of grinning children that adorn the hallway, thrown into darkness by a NATO strike … The force of the blast blew in windows and doors in the parent-funded school for children with Down’s Syndrome and officials said it damaged an orphanage on the floor above … Inside the school, the power had been knocked out by the strikes, the floor was wet because of a leaking pipe and desks were covered in glass and debris.

NATO offered no compensation. “Seddigh’s school prepared children with Down’s Syndrome up to the age of 6 to go to normal schools, giving them speech therapy, handicrafts and sports sessions and teaching them to read and write. It handles 50 to 60 children a day.”⁴²

Referring to Misrata, Médecins Sans Frontières reported in June that “bombing continues nearby, producing scores of victims.” The rebels had no air force, and Gaddafi’s had been destroyed by April, according to UK military sources. That can only mean NATO bombs. “The months of [rebel] siege left behind massive destruction, including a central pharmacy that is now a pile of rubble.”⁴³ Providing photographic evidence, Global Research correspondent Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya reported in June that

Tripoli’s Nasser University (Campus B of Al Fatah University) was bombed. University staff were injured and killed …. The unspoken objective is to destroy Libya’s economy and to prevent it from developing as a nation-state. This is why schools and universities, hospitals, shipyards, factories, not to mention residential areas, have been the target of NATO bombings.⁴⁴

Also in June 2011, the noble and courageous Cynthia McKinney, ex-Congresswoman and former Green Party Presidential Candidate, reported back from a fact-finding mission in Libya that “NATO is preventing shipments of fuel, food and medicine to come in. There have been efforts to get medicine into the country that have been denied by NATO. It is impossible to go on any street and miss the huge queues”, she said. McKinney reported that “universities and other civilian facilities are being bombed by NATO.”⁴⁵ In the video, McKinney’s fact-finder team is seen entering one hospital room after another, each with the injured and the doctor explaining how the injury occurred and showing the injuries. Houses are “completely destroyed” and meanwhile, according to McKinney, NATO has its own psychological operation in progress. “These bombs and missiles are not falling in empty spaces: people are all over Tripoli going about their lives just as in any other major metropolitan city of about two million people,” [she said].⁴⁶

Russia’s state-owned Pravda reported that in July, NATO hit a water pipes factory in al-Brega, murdering six guards, this being the factory which makes pipes for the great man-made irrigation system across the desert which brings water to seventy per cent of Libyan homes … [NATO also] hit the pipeline factory producing pipes to repair it … Cameron, Obama and Sarkozy have the blood of hundreds of innocent people on their hands, the paper reported, failing to add that the Medvedev regime also have blood on their hands for not vetoing UNSCR 1973.⁴⁷ In late August, UNICEF reported that “the country is facing a potentially disastrous water shortage … at risk of failing to meet the needs of the country’s almost 6 million people.”⁴⁸ On 2 September, UNICEF reported that “The disruption of the water supply to Tripoli through the country‘s ‘Great Man-Made River’ pipeline system has left approximately 4 million people without potable tap water.”⁴⁹

On August 5, 2011, “NATO air missiles targeted a children’s hospital in Zlitan … killing 50 children. This event clearly reveals NATO war crimes and shows that civilians are being targeted during the bombing campaigns”, Global Research reported.⁵⁰ AP reporter Paul Schemm noted in August that

The Libyan government showed foreign journalists … a destroyed flu clinic and food warehouses it said had been hit earlier in the day by NATO airstrikes, killing eight people … A nearby complex of food warehouses were also hit … and one was still burning when the journalists arrived. Each warehouse had a hole torn in the roof … “Is this the protection of civilians?” said local resident Rajab Sharaf, standing outside the burning building as the cinderblock walls buckled outward from the heat.⁵¹

Schemm was careful to use words like “allegedly” and “apparently” when reporting statements made by Gaddafi’s regime, but he used no such words in the uncritical reporting of UK Ministry of Defence officials who claimed that the RAF had struck only military targets: that was taken as gospel.

It appears that the US did the most to litter Libya with ordnance awaiting children’s limbs. “American warplanes from all services flew more than 5,350 sorties from April 1 through Aug. 23, according to statistics provided by the Pentagon. More than 1,200 of those were strike sorties, and 262 of those dropped ordnance on their missions”, the Air Force Times reported effusively. “When fighters from Libya’s rebel movement launched a battle to capture Tripoli on Aug. 20, NATO jets helped clear the path.”⁵²

According to Pentagon spokesman George Little, the US also bombed Libya with 145 drone strikes—52 of which bombed Tripoli after Gaddafi had been overthrown.⁵³

Aside from the destruction waged by the proxy militias, the UK directly contributed to the massive civilian toll: The Daily Mail noted “British jets carrying out bombing and strafing runs.”⁵⁴ If Gaddafi had only limited military capabilities, as numerous Western military sources confirmed,⁵⁵ what exactly were British bombers strafing?

This also contradicts the “precision bombing” nonsense reported in other media. UK “troops on the ground”—a violation of UNSCRs 1970 and 1973—“use a process called ‘painting a target’ to pinpoint a site to be attacked. A laser beam from a portable device is bounced off a building or military installation from a few hundred yards,” before the target is bombed. It is easy to imagine the kind of mistakes that can be made using this process, and to imagine psychopathic soldiers wanting to have a little “fun.”⁵⁶

By 31 August, the Western-installed puppet regime estimated that some 50,000 people had been killed. The devastating news was given 133 words by the Independent’s propagandist Kim Sengupta.⁵⁷ As further evidence that NATO targeted civilians, Hillary Clinton mentioned in September efforts to “provide housing for Libyans who have been bombed out or had their homes destroyed.”⁵⁸ If Gaddafi had no air force by April, who “bombed out” the civilians? In September, it was also reported that the British Royal Navy had been engaging in “psychological operations.”⁵⁹

By November, much of the country had been wrecked. In Sirte, just 25% of the residents had returned. Red Cross delegate Charlotte Bennborn reported that “There is still a lack of clean water, electricity is limited and infrastructure has been badly damaged.” The returnees were living on monthly food rations given by the Red Cross, and receiving blankets and jerrycans in order survive in their “badly damaged houses.”⁶⁰

A year after the bombing, the town of Al Qubah “had spent three months without an adequate or regular supply of potable water,” reported the Red Cross’s Sari Nasreddin. “The water network stopped functioning because no maintenance was performed on the original pumps during the conflict”, namely because NATO bombed the pipe factories. People were relying on water-trucking services, which were not able to supply enough water for all those in need.”⁶¹ A year after the bombing, Amnesty released a report:

scores of Libyan civilians who did not directly participate in hostilities were killed and many more injured as a result of NATO strikes. Regrettably more than four months since the end of the military campaign, NATO has yet to address these incidents appropriately, including by establishing contact and providing information to the victims and their relatives about any investigation which might have been initiated.

Amnesty’s limited mission recorded at least 115 civilians killed by NATO air strikes. Perhaps the depths of human suffering caused by the coup and bombing were most tragically articulated by Mustafa Naji al-Morabit, quoted in the Amnesty report:

My family has been destroyed; I lost my two little boys and my wife, Ibtisam, who was also my best friend. It is really difficult to go on, to get up every day and face life; I tell myself that I must find the strength for my son, the only child I have left. He can’t forget the horror of that day, when his mum and his little brothers were blown to bits. How can I help him to overcome this trauma? I myself can’t cope and there is no one to turn to. No one from NATO or from the authorities has got in touch to ask what happened or to offer any explanation or even one word of apology. We are living a miserable life; we have nothing left, our home and everything in it were destroyed.⁶²

READ MORE ANALYSES & ESSAYS BY
T.J. COLES, AXIS OF LOGIC COLUMNIST

Notes

1. Tim Shipman and David Williams, “SAS rounded up and booted out as Libyan mission turns to farce”, Daily Mail, 7 March, 2011,

2. Ryan Kisiel and Claire Ellicott, “Now the SAS has to train Libyan troops”, Daily Mail, 12 September, 2009, #

3. Al-Jazeera, “Libya,” 8 August, 2011,

4. Leaked memo cited in Mark Curtis, 2010, Secret Affairs, London: Serpent’s Tail, p.227.

5. See footnote 5 of my “One Year On. Why We attacked Libya”, Axis of Logic, 28 March 2012,

6. International Crisis Group, “Popular Protest in North Africa and the Middle East (V): Making Sense of Libya”, Middle East/North Africa Report N°107, 6 June 2011, Brussels: ICG,

7. Robin Lamb, “Libyan British Business Council: Director General’s Newsletter”, 28 February, 2011,

8. UK Elite Forces, “British Special Forces In Libya”, 24 August, 2011,

9. For what Gaddafi actually said, see Reuters, “Libya: We will hit civilian targets in response to foreign attack”, Ha’aretz, 17 March, 2011, For analysis of the myth of “ethnic cleansing” threats, see, for example, the Chicago Tribune’s Steve Chapman quoted in Foreign Policy, 3 April, 2011, and Alan J. Kuperman, “5 things the U.S. should consider in Libya”, USA Today, 22 March, 2011,

10. United Nations Human Rights Council, “Human rights situation that require the Council’s attention Report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Libya”, Nineteenth session, 8 March, 2012, A/HRC/19/68,

11. Amnesty International, “Militias threaten hopes for New Libya”, Index: MDE 19/002/2012, February, 2012, London: AI,

12. Amnesty International, “Q&A: Human Rights and War in Libya”, 21 March, 2011,

13. Amnesty International, “Militias threaten hopes for New Libya”, Index: MDE 19/002/2012, February, 2012, London: AI,

14. Libyan-British Business Council, “Members”, undated,

15. World Health Organization, “Libya crisis: Meeting humanitarian health needs,” 12 July, 2011,

16. Guy Hubbard, “Communities band together to reopen schools damaged in the Libyan conflict”, UNICEF, 17 October, 2011,

17. Red Cross, “Libya: ICRC supplies Sirte hospital with urgently needed medical assistance”, 1 October, 2011,

18. Human Rights Watch, “Libya: Displaced People Barred from Homes”, 21 February, 2012,

19. Amnesty International, “Libya: Deaths of detainees amid widespread torture”, 26 January, 2012,

20. Foreign Office, “Foreign Secretary updates Parliament on the Middle East and North Africa”, 13 October, 2011,

21. James Elder, “UNICEF on the ground in Benghazi, as Libyan children face increasing threat,” UNICEF, 19 April, 2011,

22. Guy Hubbard, “In the wake of the Libyan conflict, UNICEF provides support to traumatized children”, UNICEF, 24 October, 2011,

23. Christopher Tidey, “Libya’s other crisis: 2 million children at physical and emotional risk as conflict drags on”, UNICEF, 12 July, 2011,

24. See, for instance, Mona Yacoubian, “Promoting Middle East Democracy”, Special Report 127, United States Institute for Peace, October, 2004, Yacoubian: “North Africa’s population explosion and lack of economic opportunity heightened European fears of massive illegal immigration that would destabilize Europe.” See also Susi Dennison, Anthony Dworkin, Nicu Popescu, Nick Witney, “After the Revolution: Europe and the Transition in Tunisia”, Policy Brief No. 28, European Council on Foreign Relations, March 2011, London: ECFR, This paper notes: “A gesture of goodwill in the area of [educational] mobility would also be useful to counter the impression that southern EU states’ primary concern in relation to the situation in Tunisia is border control to prevent illegal migration.”

25. One needs to click the Work in Practice bar. Having done so, one can read NATO’s website statement: “NATO looks to protect critical energy infrastructures, transit areas and lines, while cooperating with partners and other organisations involved with energy security.” NATO, “NATO‘s role in energy security”, undated, NATO website,

26. Médecins Sans Frontières, “Europe must accept the boat people fleeing Libya”, 19 May, 2011,

27. United Press International, “African refugees die as Libya boat sinks”, 10 May, 2011,

28. Vivienne Walt, “Did NATO Leave 62 Africans to Die at Sea Off Libya?”, Time, 9 May, 2011,

29. Jack Shenker, “Libyan migrants’ boat deaths to be investigated by Council of Europe”, Guardian, 9 May, 2011,

30. Nima Elbagir and Jomana Karadsheh, “Hundreds missing after overcrowded boat from Libya capsizes”, CNN, 10 May, 2011,

31. Associated Press, “600 believed dead in Libya refugee boat sinking,” 10 May, 2011,

32. Socialist Worker, “Refugees from Libya left to die by Nato ships speak out”, Issue: 2255, 11 June, 2011,

33. Associated Press, “Italy finds 25 migrants dead on boat from Libya”, 1 August, 2011,

34. Daily Mail, “Fleeing refugees die of dehydration on boat bound for Italy”, 1 December, 2011,

35. International Crisis Group, “Popular Protest in North Africa and the Middle East (V): Making Sense of Libya”, Middle East/North Africa Report N°107, 6 June, 2011, Brussels: ICG,

36. Alistair Burt MP, Sir Richard Dalton, Lindsey Hilsum, Ashur Al-Shamis, and Claire Spencer, “Libya: Prospects and Challenges”, 8 June, 2011,

37. UNSMIL explained its mission: “Efforts to revive and sustain Libya’s economic growth present one illustration of the role of UNSMIL in providing an overall supportive framework for other actors, including the World Bank and IMF, to directly assist national authorities.” United Nations Security Council, “Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Support Mission in Libya”, S/2012/129, 1 March, 2012, 12-24473 (E) 050312. Likewise, the international meeting with the Transitional National Council held in London was attended by, among others, the World Bank’s Senior Counsellor for the UK and Ireland, Andrew Felton: UK Foreign Office, “The London Conference on Libya: attendees”, 29 March, 2011,

38. NATO, “Operation Unified Protector: Final Mission Stats”, 2 November, 2011,

39. United Nations Human Rights Council, “Human rights situation that require the Council’s attention Report of the International Commission of Inquiry on Libya”, Nineteenth session, 8 March, 2012, A/HRC/19/68,

40. Joe Wolverton, “Has the U.S. Issued Kill Orders Against Reporters in Libya? ”, The New American, 30 August, 2011, and
The Examiner, “Targeted Killings of non-mainstream reporters in Libya ordered: Attempts to bury truth,” 22 August, 2011,

41. Thomas C. Mountain, “NATO Poisons Libya With Depleted Uranium”, Foreign Policy, 14 May, 2011,

42. Lin Noueihed, “Libya disabled children school hit in NATO strike”, Reuters, 30 April, 2011,

43. Médecins Sans Frontières, “Libya: Trauma surgery in Misrata”, 23 June, 2011,

44. Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, “Breaking News: PHOTOGRAPHIC EVIDENCE: NATO Bombed Libya’s Nasser University”, Global Research, 12 June, 2011,

45. RT, “NATO operation in Libya is collective punishment – ex-congresswoman”, 14 June, 2011,

46. The Examiner, “Human rights fact-finders show Libyan deaths and injuries are not propaganda”, 7 June, 2011,

47. Pravda, “NATO war crime: Libya water supply” 23 July, 2011,

48. Roshan Khadivi, “UNICEF acts to stave off potential water crisis caused by fuel shortages in Libya”, UNICEF 29 August, 2011,

49. Roshan Khadivi, “Emergency aid arrives as UNICEF and partners work to restore Libya’s water system,” UNICEF, 2 September, 2011,

50. Global Research, “NATO Missiles Target Libyan Hospital, Kill 50 Children”, 5 August, 2011,

51. Paul Schemm, “Libya Hospital Reportedly Hit by NATO bombing”, Associated Press, 25 July, 2011,

52. Scott Fontaine “NATO jets helped clear path to Tripoli,” Air Force Times, 26 August, 2011,

53. RT, “US drones bombed Libya more than Pakistan”, 20 October, 2011,

54. Daily Mail, “SAS ‘Smash’ squads on the ground in Libya to mark targets for coalition jets”, 21 March, 2011,

55. See, for instance, Shashank Joshi, “ARGUMENTS FOR a No Fly Zone over Libya”, Royal United Service Institute, February, 2011, ;
Christopher M. Blanchard, “Libya: Unrest and U.S. Policy,” Congressional Research Service, 7-5700, RL33142, 29 March, 2011,

56. Daily Mail, “SAS ‘Smash’ squads on the ground in Libya to mark targets for coalition jets”, 21 March, 2011,

57. Kim Sengupta, “Rebel leaders put Libya death toll at 50,000”, Independent, 31 August, 2011,

58. Hillary Rodham Clinton, “Clinton Press Availability on Libya,” US State Department, 1 September, 2011,

59. Jonathan Marcus, “Libyan conflict: The final phase?”, BBC, 9 September, 2011,

60. Red Cross, “Libya: aid for 10,000 people returning to Sirte”, 18 November, 2011,

61. Red Cross, “Libya: hardship and danger remain”, 16 February, 2012,

62. Amnesty International, 2012, "Libya: The Forgotten Victims of NATO" Strikes, London: AI,