Archive for the ‘Libya’ Category

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The last straw? Gaddafi’s nurse is going home

February 26, 2011

As Gaddafi’s forces left Tajura – which is on the outskirts of Tripoli – the end-game is being played out for Gaddafi. There could still be considerable violence and bloodshed in Tripoli but my expectation (hope?) is that the loyalty felt towards the Libyan dictator is not going to be strong enough to keep them going for much longer. Only self-interest on the part of those closely associated with Gadaffi will keep some with him till the bitter end.

The WSJ reports that even his “voluptuous Ukrainian ” nurse, Galyna Kolotnytska, told her family yesterday that she will soon be returning home.

Galyna Kolotnytska : image vysotska.blogspot.com photo Segodnya

Embattled Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi is set to be deserted by another close ally after his Ukrainian nurse said she was heading home. Galyna Kolotnytska, described in a diplomatic cable published by Wikileaks as a “voluptuous blond” who “travel[s] everywhere” with Col. Gadhafi, called her family in Kiev on Friday to say she intends to return to Ukraine, her daughter told daily Segodnya.

“Mom got in touch yesterday. She said she was now in Tripoli,” Tetyana Kolotnytska said. “She spoke in a calm voice, asked us not to worry and said she’d soon be home.” According to the cable from September 2009, contacts in Tripoli told U.S. diplomats that Col. Gadhafi “relies heavily” on Ms. Kolotnytska, then 38, as “she alone ‘knows his routine.'”

The cable also reported claims from unnamed sources that the eccentric Libyan leader and the nurse, part of a retinue of four Ukrainians, “have a romantic relationship.” Ms. Kolotnytska’s daughter said her mother had been in Libya for nine years, originally employed in a hospital before starting work for Col. Gadhafi. “Other Ukrainian women also work for him as nurses. Mom is one of them,” she said. “For some reason, he doesn’t trust Libyan women with this matter.”

Perhaps his mistrust of Libyan women will play a prominent role in the inevitable end. Poison in the desert  – either self administered or by those around him – once his Ukrainian nurses are gone could be what awaits.

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Posted in Behaviour, Libya | 3 Comments »

Gaddafi Jr.’s PhD thesis from LSE being examined for plagiarism

February 24, 2011

After the success of the on-line analysis of Guttenberg’s PhD thesis from Bayreuth University which proved that more than two-thirds of the pages had plagiarised content, the suspect thesis of Gadaffi Jr. from the LSE is also being examined on line here.

It would probably be a good idea for LSE to apply some plagiarism software and get ahead of the curve.

From Wikipedia:

Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi received his Ph.D. from the London School of Economics in 2008. Through the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation, Saif subsequently pledged a donation of £1.5 million to support the work of the LSE’s Centre for the Study of Global Governance on civil society organizations in North Africa. Following the political uprising in Libya in February 2011, the LSE has issued a statement indicating that it will cut all financial ties with the country and will accept no further money from the Foundation, having already received and spent the first £300,000 installment of the donation.

Saif’s Ph.D. thesis has been made available online and commentators have already identified several passages which appear to have been copied from other sources without attribution. There is speculation that the thesis was plagiarized and/or ghostwritten by another individual.

Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi

Analysis of Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi’s LSE Thesis:

“THE ROLE OF CIVIL SOCIETY IN THE DEMOCRATISATION OF GLOBAL GOVERNANCE INSTITUTIONS”
(PDF)

In the Guttenberg case, Bayreuth University has now rescinded his PhD in an investigation which lasted less than a week. As Professor Debora Weber-Wulff points out this must be the fastest ever decision by a German University in over 400 years!!

Well, this has to be a record. I believe this is the shortest university decision process in the last 400 years or so. Last Tuesday evening the story broke, just over a week later the university commission for good scientific work at the University of Bayreuth reached a decision. They are rescinding his doctorate.

They didn’t go into details, and most important, didn’t decide if he plagiarized on purpose. He says he didn’t, the documentation found on the GuttenPlagWiki screams a different story. Since he has announced that he wanted to withdraw his doctorate anyway, he won’t contest it, so they don’t have to do the normal detailed analysis.

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Posted in Corruption, Education, Fraud, Germany, Libya, scientific misconduct | 1 Comment »

Gaddafi ordered Lockerbie strike says his former Justice Minister

February 23, 2011

The Local reports: (Original Swedish report in Expressen is here)

Photo: Scanpix (file)

Photo: Scanpix (file)

Colonel Muammar Gaddafi ordered the 1988 terror attack that downed a Pan Am airliner over Lockerbie in Scotland, the Libyan leader’s former justice minister told a Swedish reporter on Wednesday.

“I have evidence that Qaddafi gave the orders for Lockerbie,” Mustafa Abdel-Jalil told a reporter for Swedish tabloid Expressen who is currently stationed in Libya.

Until Monday, Abdel-Jalil served as minister of justice to Qaddafi, but resigned in protest “over the excessive use of violence against government protesters” he is quoted as telling the privately-owned Quryna newspaper.

According to Abdel-Jalil, his former boss gave the orders to carry out the Lockerbie bombing, which claimed the lives of 259 people on board Pan Am Flight 103 as well 11 people in the Scottish village below.

Among those killed in the bombing was Swedish diplomat Bernt Carlsson, who was serving in the United Nations at the time.

Following a lengthy probe involving Scotland Yard and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), as well as other agencies, investigators concluded that the bomb had been placed on the plane by two Libyan nationals working for the country’s intelligence services.

In 1991, charges were filed against Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer and the head of security for Libyan Arab Airlines (LAA), as well as Lamin Khalifah Fhimah, a Malta-based LAA station manager.

Following lengthy negotiations, Qaddafi agreed to hand over the two suspects to Scottish police in 1999 so they could stand trial in the Netherlands.

See also: Lockerbie bomber release orchestrated by Tony Blair’s gov’t in exchange for trade deals

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Bunga bunga Berlusconi sinks to new depths with Gaddafi

February 22, 2011

As Gaddafi threatens more bloodshed and seems to be increasingly removed from reality, the eastern part of Libya including Benghazi is clearly no longer under his control. He does not seem to be on his way to Venezuela but is looking to his special relationship with Berlusconi.

ABC News reports that bunga bunga Berlusconi is now providing further support to his friend Gaddafi by telephone:

Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi has spoken by telephone with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi amid a bloody crackdown by Libyan forces on anti-government protesters.

A one-sentence statement from Berlusconi’s office late Tuesday said the phone call took place in the afternoon. It gave no details.

Berlusconi has called Gadhafi his “friend” and has entertained the Libyan leader several times in Rome.

With Italy’s Eni, the main foreign operator in Libya taking home a full one-third of the north African nation’s oil production, it is no surprise that a succession of Italian governments have sought a cozy relationship with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi — none less than the extravagant embrace by current Premier Silvio Berlusconi.

 

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Posted in Behaviour, Corruption, Italy, Libya | 1 Comment »

Berlusconi won’t “disturb” Gaddafi – as one Dirty Old Man supports another

February 21, 2011

As the brush fire of revolution against dictators spreads in North Africa and the Middle East, Bunga bunga Berlusconi ( 75 years old) announced that he will not “disturb” his soul-brother Gaddafi (69 years) in his time of trial. They are of course both senior members of the Association of Dirty Old Leaders.

Reuters reports:

Opposition lawmakers criticised Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi for failing to condemn violence in Libya and saying he did not want to “disturb” Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi during the revolt in his country.

Berlusconi’s government, which has aggressively courted Libyan petrodollars and rolled out the red carpet during Gaddafi’s multiple visits to Italy, has said little on Libya’s crackdown on protesters that has killed more than 170 people.

Pressed by reporters on whether he had spoken to Gaddafi since the uprising began, Berlusconi said on Saturday: “No, I haven’t been in contact with him. The situation is still in flux and so I will not allow myself to disturb anyone.”

The comment stirred outrage among the leftist opposition, which has long accused Berlusconi of turning a blind eye to Gaddafi’s human rights record and pandering to the Libyan leader for the sake of lucrative contracts and investment in Italy, which is Libya’s former colonial ruler.

In this photograph from June 2009 where Berlusconi is welcoming Gaddafi accompanied by a rather plump member of his all-woman bodyguard, it is not clear why Gaddafi finds it necessary to wear cardboard medals and an old photograph on his chest. It is probably something only Bunga bunga will know.

Silvio Berlusconi welcomes Muammar Gaddafi at Rome Ciampino airport

Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi welcomes Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi at Rome's Ciampinio airport, Italy, on 10 June 2009. Photograph: ALESSANDRO DI MEO/EPA

As the Guardian put it when Gaddafi visited Italy in 2009:

The highlight of Gaddafi’s trip to Rome is a meeting, personally requested by the Libyan leader, with 700 women from the worlds of “politics, industry and culture”. So Berlusconi got down his Bumper Catalogue of Hot Stuff, got rid of any that were over 25, discarded those with a loud voice or body hair, and whittled down the rest by ballot until he got to 1,000, whereupon the disappointed remainder that didn’t get to meet Muammar were given a senior post in his cabinet or a mini-break in his fancy villa with the pools and the elephants.

Before we start thinking this is just a pact of weirdness between two profoundly weird men, it is not the first time Gaddafi has extended the hand of friendship to the ladies of Europa (I do not mean the convenience store chain; I am romanticising the continent, trying to get into the mind of the mighty dictator). Two years ago in Paris, he met 1,000 French women. His message was clear: he wanted to “save European women”.

Gaddafi and his nurse: image EPA

Of course in addition to his bodyguards Wikileaks has told us that he also has his own voluptuous Ukrainian nurse(s).

Diplomats in Tripoli described how the Libyan leader appeared to be reliant on Galyna Kolotnytska, without whom he reportedly “cannot travel”.

In a despatch to the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, sent in September 2009, embassy officials painted an intimate portrait of Col Gaddafi’s many fears and “eccentricities”.

The secret memo, which was headed “A glimpse into Libyan leader Gaddafi’s eccentricities”, said he “appears to rely” on his senior nurse, and less than in the past on his “legendary” band of women bodyguards who used to accompany him everywhere.

 

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