NATO STEPS UP ASSISTANCE TO LIBYAN OPPOSITION
France, Britain, and Italy have all announced plans to send military advisors to assist Libyan rebels fighting to overthrow the country’s besieged dictator, Moammar Ghaddafi. The opposition fighters have established their interim leadership, known as the Transitional National Council (TNC), in the city of Benghazi in rebel-held eastern Libya, but efforts to push westward to the national capital, Tripoli, have stalled in recent weeks. All three NATO countries have stated that they are sending a dozen or fewer military advisors, and a French Foreign Ministry spokeswoman described the mission as designed to “give the TNC essentially technical, logistical, and organizational advice to reinforce the protection of civilians and to improve the distribution of humanitarian and medical aid.”
Libyan opposition leaders, for their part, have for the first time begun making requests for Western countries to provide boots on the ground to fight Ghaddafi’s forces. “Before we were asking for no foreign interference, but that was before Ghadafi used Grad rockets and planes. Now it’s a life or death situation,” said Nuri Abdullah Abdullati, a senior member of the governing council in Misrata, the last rebel-held city in western Libya, which is currently under siege from government forces. (Istanbul Hurriyet, April 20, 2011)
QATAR SUPPLIES LIBYAN REBELS WITH “DEFENSIVE WEAPONS”
Qatar has now directly joined the effort to support Libya’s rebels as well, with news reports confirming that the tiny Gulf state has been providing anti-tank weapons to Ghaddafi's opposition. Qatari officials have not provided details about the arms transfer, but Qatar’s prime minister and foreign minister have stated that the UN resolution which established the no-fly zone over Libya also permits the supply of “defensive weapons” to the Libyan opposition. Qatar has been the only Arab country so far to recognize the interim government in Benghazi, and Qatari officials have confirmed, off the record, that their military is supplying French-made Milan missiles to the rebels there. It is unclear, however, whether the missiles are owned by Qatar or the country is simply serving as an intermediary for the French. Libyan officials have been complaining for days that Qatari “specialists” were already operating out of Benghazi. (London Guardian, April 14, 2011)
CAMP ASHRAF UNDER FIRE
[Editor’s Note: The Iranian dissident group known as the Mujahideen e-Khalq (MEK) have been clustered in an Iraqi refugee camp known as Camp Ashraf since 1986, when Saddam Hussein, at the time engaged in a war with neighboring Iran, offered them shelter. The new Iraqi government, with its close ties to Iran, has been uncomfortable hosting the MEK, and has sought their expulsion for years. Over time, this has turned the U.S. into a mediator and quasi-defender of the group. But with the U.S. departing the country soon, Iraq’s leaders are turning up the heat in an attempt to evict the MEK from camp Ashraf for good.]
In early April, Iraqi security forces stormed Camp Ashraf, home to 3,400 Iranian dissidents, leading to clashes with the Iranian dissidents housed there that left 34 dead and 318 wounded. Iraqi officials say the raid, conducted by the Iraqi Army with Humvees and armored vehicles, was designed to return land from the camp to Iraqi farmers. Washington has urged Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki to show “restraint” and called on him to conduct an investigation into the raid and to guarantee Ashraf residents receive humane treatment. The U.S. disarmed residents of Camp Ashraf back in 2009, promising to protect the camp in return. Meanwhile, the MEK has released footage showing the Iraqi army firing on civilians and former senior U.S. officials have called on the Iraqi government to halt raids into the camp. An Iraqi government spokesmen has said Ashraf residents must leave Iraq by year’s end. (New York Times, April 13, 2011)
SYRIA WRACKED BY PROTESTS
After being spared the unrest of its neighbors for several months, Syria is being hit by the largest wave of protests since president Bashar al Assad assumed power after the death of his father, the country’s longtime dictator, over ten years ago. On Thursday, April 21, President Assad lifted the government’s 48-year-old state of emergency law and abolished the state security court – addressing two of the protesters top demands. An additional concession included recognizing the right to peaceful protests. However, these changes have failed to assuage opposition protesters. Demonstrations had been spreading from smaller towns in the countryside to the nation’s major metropolitan areas over the past two weeks, but on Friday, April 22, a day after the emergency laws were lifted, protesters held the largest gathering to date following Friday prayers. Early reports suggest at least 30 people have been killed by Syrian security forces as a result, and Amnesty International estimates over 228 have been killed since demonstrations began in mid-March. (CNN, April 22, 2011)
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