Landmark Tripoli meeting seals ties

Tripoli: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice held a landmark meeting with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to seal a reconciliation with the former US enemy.

Rice said on Saturday before leaving that the United States and Libya had decided "to move forward in a positive way" and deal "as well as we can with issues of the past".

The first US secretary of state to visit Tripoli in 55 years exchanged gifts with Gaddafi. He gave her a lute instrument and she presented a shield with the department's coat of arms.

But the tensions have not completely disappeared.

Libyan Foreign Minister Abdul Rahman Mohammad Shalgam said his country does not need "pressure" or "lectures" on human rights, one of the issues raised by Rice in talks.

Rice declared however: "After many, many years it is a good thing that the US and Libya found a way forward." She praised some "strategic choices" made by Libya.

"This is a good time for a constructive relationship between the US and Libya to emerge," Rice said.

Shalgam said the world has changed and Rice's groundbreaking visit to Libya was proof of the new mood.

No permanent enemy

"The time of confrontation is over," he declared. "There may still be differences of opinion but this will not endanger the relationship."

Rice earlier described her brief visit as "historic".

"That is not to say that everything has by any means been settled between the United States and Libya," she added.

"There is a long way to go. But I do believe that it has demonstrated that the United States doesn't have permanent enemies. It demonstrates that when countries are prepared to make strategic changes in direction the United States is prepared to respond."

Diplomats said Rice wanted Iran and North Korea to know that they could benefit from rapprochement with the West, highlighting Libya's commitment to abandon nuclear, biological and chemical weapons programmes.

Rice met Gaddafi at his Tripoli residence, Bab Al Azizia, which was hit in US bombing raids ordered by Reagan in 1986, and after talks they shared an iftar meal.

Tripoli: Top US diplomat Condoleezza Rice met Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi on Friday on a historic trip to the north African country she said was proof that Washington had no "permanent enemies".

On Friday, Rice said she hoped there would be a new US ambassador in Libya "soon."

The meeting on Friday evening began when Gaddafi, wearing a white robe decorated with a broach in the shape of Africa, welcomed Rice and her aides at a room lined with armchairs in a building in a government compound in central Tripoli.

There was no handshake between the two. As Rice entered the room, Gaddafi raised a hand to his chest in a traditional gesture of welcome. He then shook hands with members of her staff.

"This demonstrates that the US doesn't have permanent enemies," Rice earlier told reporters in Tripoli, a normally sleepy port city where streets were cleared for her motorcade as it sped from the airport to government offices.

"It demonstrates that when countries are prepared to make strategic changes in direction, the United States is prepared to respond. Quite frankly I never thought I would be visiting Libya and so it is quite something," she said.

"This trip is acknowledging how far the US-Libyan relationship has come, but it is the beginning and not the end of the story."

US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles was the last top US diplomat to visit Tripoli and made the trip in May 1953, before Rice was born. Libya is a major oil exporter.

Rice met Libya's Foreign Minister Mohammad Abdul Rahman Shalgam before meeting Gaddafi. Shalgam later told the official Libyan Jana news agency that the two discussed cooperation in various fields "especially oil as well as education, with thousands of Libyan students now in the United States".

Rice held back from visiting Libya until a compensation package was signed last month to cover legal claims involving victims of US and Libyan bombings.

Rice said she was looking forward to meeting Gaddafi by President Ronald Reagan - and planned to discuss, among other issues, the conflict in Sudan and Libya's "important" role there.

Gaddafi has in the past expressed admiration for Rice.