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Ghoga met former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi for the first time on 6 February 2011, only eleven days before the popular revolution. Gaddafi had Ghoga and three other lawyers from Benghazi be brought to a meeting with him in his tent in Tripoli.

The meeting lasted for ninety minutes. Also present was Abdullah Senussi, Gaddafi's brother-in-law and head of his secret service. The four human rights lawyers from Benghazi called for freedom of the press, freedom of opinion, and a constitution.

After the discussion with Gaddafi, who, according to Ghoga's words, was clearly irritated at the demands, the four lawyers from Benghazi decided to call for a "Day of Rage" in Benghazi on 17 February 2011. This was the beginning of the Libyan revolution.

http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdul_Hakim_Ghoga

Juan Cole sets the record straight on the revolution in Libya:

I have taken a lot of heat for my support of the [Libyan] revolution and of the UN-authorized intervention by the Arab League and NATO that kept it from being crushed. [...] I agree with President Obama and his citation of Reinhold Niebuhr: You cannot protect all victims of mass murder everywhere all the time. But where you can do some good, you should do it, even if you cannot do all good. [...] Given the controversies about the revolution, it is worthwhile reviewing the myths about the Libyan Revolution that led so many observers to make so many fantastic or just mistaken assertions about it.

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A shocking scene occurred in Tripoli on Saturday when a gun was pointed at Sky News after a woman tried to tell foreign journalists about being raped and tortured by Libyan officials.

A visibly very distressed woman burst into the breakfast room of the hotel where we are staying and attempted to speak out about an ordeal at the hands of Gaddafi supporters.

We were having breakfast in our hotel when the woman broke in and said she'd been picked up at a checkpoint in the city. She claimed she had been held for two days, and that she had been raped and tortured.

As journalists tried to speak to her, things got out of control and the police minders waded in, trying to physically shut her up and stop her talking. The woman was gagged by hand and taken away by minders.

In the commotion a gun was pointed towards the Sky News team in an attempt to stop them filming. A team from another news organisation had their camera smashed in front of them.

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Article/201009115960663

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Onko länsimaalaisilla mahdollisuutta olla oikeassa, kun jossakin syntyy kansainvälisiin mittoihin ulottuva konflikti ja ihmishenkiä menetetään joka tapauksessa? Seuraamalla reaktioita liitoutuman Libya-interventioon tuntuu, että joidenkin mielestä eipä juuri.

Jos länsi olisi vain seurannut sivusta, kun sen tähän asti sietämä Libyan diktaattori Muammar Gaddafi teloitti omia kansalaisiaan, sitä olisi voitu syyttää välinpitämättömyydestä, tekopyhyydestä tai valikoivasta sekaantumisesta. Kun se päätti sekaantua, on sekin väärin.

Länsimaita voidaan syyttää tekopyhyydestä siitä syystä, että ne ovat mielistelleet diktaattoreita koko alueella. Arabimaailmaa on totuttu katsomaan kuin aluetta, jossa asuu ikään kuin erilainen ihmislaji, jolle tyrannia on normaalia, koska he eivät pysty parempaan.

Arabidemokraattien tukeminen on leimattu imperialismiksi, diktatuureja on oikeutettu sillä, että se onkin “heidän kulttuuriaan”. Tai sitten heidän "kulttuurinsa", jolla tarkoitetaan fundamentalistista islamia tai vanhankantaista heimolaisuutta, edellyttää kovaa kättä.

Tämän relativistisen moralisoinnin takana on välinpitämättömyyttä, ajattelun laiskuutta, rasismia ja ahneutta. Ne, jotka tuomitsevat auttajat ristiretkeläisiksi ja kolonialisteiksi, tuomitsevat alueen asukkaat barbaareiksi, joille demokratiaa on turha edes tarjota.

The UN resolution that authorized military force to protect civilians from attacks by Muammar Gaddafi’s troops has made history. For the first time, the UN Security Council authorized measures specifically to protect civilians under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, which means they are militarily enforceable. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called the decision "historic."

The council resolution [pdf] "affirms, clearly and unequivocally, the international community’s determination to fulfill its responsibility to protect civilians from violence perpetrated on them by their own government. The resolution authorizes the use of all necessary measures, including a no-fly zone to prevent further casualties and loss of innocent lives."

"Ten years ago, the world probably would not even have considered such a resolution," said Edward Luck, UN Special Advisor on the Responsibility to Protect. "Today, the principle of human protection and responsibility to protect are so strong that even governments traditionally worried about sovereignty did not want to stand in the way of forceful council action."

Luck pointed out that protection of civilians has been included in many UN resolutions. What makes the resolution on Libya historic is that "this is the first time that the council has taken Chapter 7 enforcement measures specifically to ensure the responsibility to protect," he said. "This authorizes a much greater use of coercive force if necessary."

Former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan first raised the issue at the annual meeting of the UN General Assembly in 1999, telling ministers that the main challenge facing the United Nations in the 21st century was its role in protecting civilians. He called for “humanitarian intervention” to protect civilians in strife-torn regions -- a proposal that China and other countries rejected.

Many countries argued that human rights were an internal affair and any intervention would violate national sovereignty. Six years later, however, Annan finally succeeded. World leaders attending a UN summit in 2005 agreed that governments had a collective responsibility to protect people from genocide, war crimes, and ethnic cleansing.

Passage of the Security Council resolution on Libya marked "a significant advance of the rule of law in maintaining international peace," according to William Pace, Executive Director of the World Federalist Movement. The group hosts a coalition of non-governmental organizations working to implement the agreement on the responsibility to protect.

Mr Pace noted that the resolution came on top of an earlier resolution imposing sanctions on Gaddafi’s regime and referring Libya to the International Criminal Court for possible crimes against humanity. "It offers hope to all who are trying to resist dictators who have committed these crimes with impunity for centuries, and very often against their own people," he said.

Al Jazeera broke into Libyan state TV showing Gaddafi in a jeep, donning a Russian fur hat and struggling with a ginormous umbrella. He said: "I want to have some rest. I was talking to the young men at Green Square; I wanted to stay the night with them, but then it started to rain. I wanted to show them that I am in Tripoli, not in Venezuela. Don't believe those dogs in the media."

http://aje.me/ajelive

Two influential US consultancy firms, The Livingston Group (LTG) and Monitor Group, had prepared strategies to reintroduce the Libyan dictator, Muammar Gaddafi, on the international arena, according to documents published in 2009 by the Libyan opposition group, National Conference of the Libyan Opposition (NCLO). (LTG said it had dropped Gaddafis' regime as a client.)

The documents showed that Gaddafi's regime would have paid millions of dollars for the publicity campaigns and related services, including a book lauding Libya under Gaddafi's rule. The book would have been based on conversations between Gaddafi and "renowned expert visitors," such as Benjamin Barber, Francis Fukuyama, Anthony Giddens, Richard Perle, among others.

In one document, Mark Fuller, CEO of Monitor Group, said he would woo foreign dignitaries to Libya to boost the regime's image. Under the strategy outlined, Monitor Group would push for positive articles about Gaddafi's regime to be published in US and international media, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, The Economist, Financial Times, and others.

The goal of the publicity campaigns was to introduce Gaddafi as a "thinker and intellectual." Also, LTG would have groomed Gaddafi's fourth son, Mutassim, for leadership, teach him English, and help set up a National Security Council that he would head. One of LTG's invoices --for USD 617,000-- was called "Project Armani." Could it have been a reference to Mutassim's suits?

http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2009/07/29/hugh-miles/the-cost-of-letters/