Paris talks call for unfreezing Libya assets

Dubai: World leaders meeting at a conference on Libya’s future in Paris on Thursday pledged to return billions of dollars in frozen overseas assets to the people of Libya and to quickly open new embassies in Tripoli.

They welcomed the National Transitional Council (NTC) into the international fold as defiant ousted dictator Muammar Gaddafi again vowed not to surrender, urging his supporters to keep up their resistance.

The Paris talks — attended by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, British Prime Minister David Cameron, UAE Foreign Minister Shaikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan and a host of foreign leaders and ministers — began against the backdrop of a new Gaddafi rant.
“Let there be a long fight and let Libya be engulfed in flames,” Gaddafi was quoted as saying from his hiding place in a message carried on Arabic news channels. “We will not give up. We are not women.”

The fugitive leader was speaking on the 42nd anniversary of the military coup that toppled King Idris and brought him to power in 1969.

In Paris, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who co-hosted the meeting with Cameron, said around 60 countries and international organisations had “all pledged to free the money of the Libya of yesterday to finance the development of the Libya of today.”

Earlier, the European Union has agreed to a partial lifting of its freeze on the assets of 28 Libyan entities, in what the bloc’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said was a move to help Libya’s economy “function again.”

Nato attacks to continue

Sarkozy and Cameron also said the Nato campaign would continue as long as Gaddafi and his loyalists posed a threat. Their words were echoed by the alliance’s Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, who said the operations will continue for as long as the civilians are in danger.

UN chief Ban urged the Security Council to make a swift decision on deploying a civilian mission to stabilise Libya.

He said the meeting agreed that the UN would now take the lead on assisting Libya’s new leadership and called for prompt action to deploy a civilian mission as rapidly as possible.

Clinton urged the revolutionaries to secure weapons amassed by Gaddafi and ensure they aren’t used to threaten the country’s neighbours or the rest of the world. Calling for more support for the NTC, she asked the council members to protect the rights of all Libyans, particularly women and minorities.

Sarkozy earlier welcomed NTC leaders Mustafa Abdul Jalil and Mahmoud Jibril to the Elysee Palace for talks with good news on the diplomatic front. Russia — which opposed Nato’s military support for the revolutionaries’ battle to overthrow him — said it recognised the NTC as Libya’s “ruling authority”.

Call to people

China, which also had reservations about the air campaign, did not go so far, but said it “respects the choice made by the Libyan people and attaches importance to the significant position and role played by the NTC.”
Only African Union heavyweight South Africa continued to snub the NTC with President Jacob Zuma boycotting the talks.

NTC chief Abdul Jalil called on the Libyan people to “act first” to bring about democracy and reconciliation. “We stood by you and so did the international community. Now everything is in your hands. It’s up to you to accomplish what we promised: stability, peace and reconciliation,” he said.