Updated Tue Feb 22, 2011 10:42am AEDT
Thousands protest in the Libyan city of Benghazi. (www.youtube.com)
Libya faces chaos and possible civil war as Moamar Gaddafi fights to maintain his 41-year grip on power in the face of a popular uprising.
Middle East analyst Philip McCrum says even if he flees - assuming he could find a refuge - Mr Gaddafi would leave a nation with few normal structures for a peaceful transition, after four decades of his idiosyncratic rule.
"Any post-Gaddafi period is fraught with uncertainty," Mr McCrum said.
"There is no organised opposition, there are no civil institutions around which people could ordinarily gather.
"The opposition in exile is small and disparate. It will therefore take a long time for a new political order to establish itself and in the meantime political tensions will run high as various competing groups, such as the tribes, the army, Islamists and liberals, vie for power."
Dozens of people have been killed during days of uprising in Libya, as anti-government protests reach the capital, Tripoli, for the first time. Several eastern cities appear to be in opposition hands. The revolt has already cost more than 200 lives.
Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, one of the mercurial leader's sons, has appeared on state TV, mixing threats with appeals for calm, saying the army would enforce security at any price.
"We will keep fighting until the last man standing, even the last woman standing," he said, waving a finger at the camera.
Mr McCrum says Saif al-Islam's speech had probably scotched any hopes among young Libyans that he could be a force for reform.
The uprising in Libya already looks set to be the bloodiest in a series of popular protests racing across the Middle East from Algeria to Yemen. Possibilities for compromise look slim.
'Armed to the teeth'
Shadi Hamid of the Brookings Doha Centre in Qatar says Libya is the most likely candidate for civil war because the government has lost control over part of its own territory.
"Benghazi was lost to the opposition and there are reports of other smaller cities going the same way. It is not something the Gaddafi regime is willing to tolerate," he said.
Benghazi, a city in eastern Libya - the region that is home to most of the country's oilfields - is a traditional hotbed of anti-Gaddafi sentiment among tribes hostile to his rule.
As the protests have snowballed, Islamic leaders and once-loyal tribes have declared for the opposition.
Saad Djebbar, a London-based Algerian lawyer who for years defended Libya in the Lockerbie airline bombing case, says Mr Gaddafi must go.
"I'm sure he has armed to the teeth his own tribesmen and those tribes linked to him. I'm sure he will be also giving them as much cash as possible," he said.
Mr Djebbar says Mr Gaddafi has narrowed the circle of his power to his close family and tribe in recent years, alienating allies and tribes who had backed him after he seized power in 1969.
"Gaddafi will go down fighting and Libyans will butcher each other. It's a fight to the bitter end. If he activates the tribal card, it will only turn Libya into another Somalia," he said.
Mr Djebbar says Western powers should consider protecting any rebel-held areas such as eastern Libya by using air power to bar Mr Gaddafi from bombing his foes into submission - similar to the no-fly zone they set up in Iraqi Kurdistan after the 1991 Gulf War to deter Saddam Hussein from reasserting control there.
'Nowhere to go'
Mr McCrum says Mr Gaddafi is behaving like a "cornered animal".
"When threatened he attacks ferociously," he said.
"Throughout his rule he has shown no qualms in brutally suppressing any opposition.
"He is highly unlikely to make any concessions and if he goes down, he will take as many people with him as possible," Mr McCrum added, predicting that events in Libya "will only get bloodier".
Mr McCrum says he doubts the army will turn on Mr Gaddafi or emulate the role played by the military in facilitating the departure of long-serving autocrats in Egypt and Tunisia.
"The army will not actually effect regime change as in Egypt. They will simply perpetuate the status quo to protect their own interests," he said, noting that main arms of the security services were controlled by sons of Mr Gaddafi.
Libya, once a pariah accused of sponsoring international terrorism, rehabilitated itself by paying compensation to victims of the Lockerbie bombing and other attacks, and by renouncing its efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction.
"If ever there was a regime which exposes the West's hypocrisy, Gaddafi's is it," Mr McCrum said.
Middle East analyst at Control Risks, Julien Barnes-Dace, says in terms of investment risk it is "very serious".
"The West has fallen over itself to rehabilitate Gaddafi so they can get at his oil and now it will pay the price in political capital - if it has any left," he said.
"People are just pulling out. Even if Gaddafi survives, there will be huge worries and reputational issues about doing business in Libya. Libya would be much more isolated after this."
Analyst Geoff Porter says Mr Gaddafi has "nowhere to go", unlike ousted Arab leaders such as Tunisia's Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, who found refuge in Saudi Arabia, or Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, in internal exile in Sharm el-Sheikh.
"Possibly the only place he can go is Zimbabwe," he said. "So there is no alternative. [If he is toppled], he will be like Saddam Hussein and end up hiding in a hole."
Reuters
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Libya: Key facts
Updated Tue Feb 22, 2011 10:22am AEDT
Idriss was overthrown on September 1, 1969 by Moamar Gaddafi, who is now the Arab world's longest-serving leader. (Reuters: Zohra Bensemra)
Key facts about the north African state of Libya after days of anti-regime unrest following revolutions in two of its neighbours, Tunisia and Egypt:
Geography: Libya is bordered by the Mediterranean to the north, Egypt to the east and Tunisia and Algeria to the west. It borders Niger, Chad and Sudan in the south. About 93 per cent of its territory is desert.
Area: At 1,760,000 square kilometres, Libya is the third-largest country in Africa, after Sudan and Algeria.
Population: About 6.3 million, of whom some 1 million are immigrants, mainly from sub-Saharan Africa.
Capital: Tripoli.
Official language: Arabic.
Religion: Islam 97 per cent (almost entirely Sunni), Christianity 3 per cent.
History: Coastal areas were settled successively by Phoenician traders, Romans and Byzantines before the area became part of successive Islamic empires from the seventh century AD.
In the early 20th century, the country was seized from the declining Ottoman Empire by Italy, which gave it its modern name and ruled it with considerable violence until World War II, when its deserts saw epic tank battles between Allied and Axis troops.
Libya became independent in 1951 with King Mohammed Idriss al-Senussi as its head of state. Idriss was overthrown on September 1, 1969 by Moamar Gaddafi, who is now the Arab world's longest-serving leader.
Through much of the 1980s and 1990s, Libya was considered a pariah state by the West, and its capital was bombed by US aircraft in 1986 in retaliation for alleged support for terrorism.
On the same grounds, Tripoli was subjected to UN and US trade embargoes, which were lifted in 2003 and 2004 respectively.
Government: In 1977, Mr Gaddafi proclaimed the Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, or republic of the masses, which purported to give power directly to the people.
He has always eschewed the title of head of state, preferring to call himself the guide and leader of the revolution.
The highest political authority is the General People's Congress, which functions as a parliament and heads the people's committees. The General People's Committee is the cabinet.
Economy: Oil was discovered in 1959 and is Libya's main natural resource, with a production capacity of about 1.8 million barrels per day. Estimated reserves are 44 billion barrels. Oil accounts for more than 95 per cent of exports and 75 per cent of the state budget. The country has an estimated 1.5 trillion cubic metres of gas.
GDP: $US93.2 billion in 2008 (World Bank). GDP per capita: $14,400 in 2008 (US Central Intelligence Agency).
Currency: Dinar. (One US dollar 1.25 Libyan dinar)
Military: Estimated at 76,000 men, with 50,000 in the army. The auxiliary People's Militia numbered about 40,000 reservists in 2009, according to the International Institute of Strategic Studies.
- AFP
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Gaddafi's 41-year reign under siege
Updated Wed Feb 23, 2011 6:45am AEDT
Libya's leader Moamar Gaddafi looks on during a news conference at the Quirinale palace in Rome on June 10, 2009. (Reuters: Max Rossi)
Libyan leader Moamar Gaddafi is facing an unprecedented challenge to his four-decade rule of the oil-rich North African country.
In power for nearly 42 years, the one-time political pariah had imposed himself as a key international player the West could not ignore.
As a young colonel, Mr Gaddafi led a coup on September 1, 1969 overthrowing the Western-backed elderly King Idriss, and quickly established himself as a belligerent, unpredictable and flamboyant leader.
Reputedly born in a Bedouin tent in the desert near Sirte in 1942, Mr Gaddafi alienated the West soon after seizing power, accusing it of launching a "new crusade" against the Arabs.
His idol was Egyptian president and fervent Arab nationalist Gamal Abdel Nasser, and he also variously declared himself a fan of Mao Zedong, Stalin and even Hitler.
For decades Libya was linked to a spate of terrorist attacks the world over, with Mr Gaddafi also being accused of using Libya's oil wealth - the country is Africa's third largest producer - to fund and arm rebel groups across Africa and beyond.
Libya became an international pariah in the aftermath of the 1988 Lockerbie airliner bombing, but relations began to thaw when it agreed to pay compensation to the families of the 270 people who were killed.
Mr Gaddafi also renounced terrorism and declared in 2003 that he was giving up the pursuit of weapons of mass destruction, prompting the lifting of UN sanctions.
The declaration also dramatically shored-up Libya's ties with the West and was crowned with a visit in September 2008 by then US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice.
In February 2009, Mr Gaddafi was elected chairman of the African Union, after he tired from championing Arab unity and months after African tribal dignitaries bestowed on him the title of "king of kings".
He is known for receiving world leaders in a bedouin tent, rather than in palatial buildings, and often dresses in colourful flowing robes, surrounded by an entourage of female bodyguards.
Courting controversy
His country has often been the focus of international attention.
In 2007, Tripoli released Bulgarian medics who had spent eight years in jail for allegedly infecting hundreds of Libyan children with HIV-tainted blood.
In 2008, the festive homecoming of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi, who was released by Scottish authorities on compassionate grounds, triggered fury in the United States.
And an apology to Libya the same year by Swiss president Hans-Rudolf Merz over the 2007 arrest of one of Mr Gaddafi's sons, Hannibal, drew harsh criticism across the Alpine nation.
The Arab world's longest-serving leader continues to rile the West and Arab leaders with his belligerent and provocative statements, although he has said nothing in public since the anti-regime protests began less than a week ago.
In July 2009, he blasted the UN Security Council as a form of "terrorism" in a speech at a Non-Aligned Movement summit.
In March the same year, he hurled insults at Saudi King Abdullah at an Arab summit, telling him: "You are always lying and you're facing the grave and you were made by Britain and protected by the United States."
Mr Gaddafi can be quick to praise himself.
"I am the leader of the Arab leaders, the king of kings of Africa and the imam of the Muslims," he has said.
On a trip to Italy he was quoted as describing women in the Arab and Muslim world as "a piece of furniture you can change when you want" and said the situation needed a "feminine revolution."
Mr Gaddafi, who proclaimed a Jamahiriya or "state of the masses" in March 1977, is officially known as "guide of the revolution" as he has always shunned the title president.
His revolutionary Green Book, also published in 1977, offers "a third theory of the world" between capitalism and socialism, and according to him provides the only real solution for humanity.
Mr Gaddafi is reportedly grooming his son, Seif al-Islam - one of eight children plus an adopted daughter who was killed in US bombing raids in 1986 - as his successor.
- AFP
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