Panetta warns Tripoli of tough times, offers help

Tripoli : US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta told Libya's leaders yesterday they faced a long, hard road in moving on from 42 years of one-man rule and uniting rival militias that still hold the streets in the oil-producing North African state.

Panetta, the first US defence chief ever to visit Libya, said Washington stood ready to help but offered no specific aid to a leadership struggling to stamp its authority two months after the capture and killing of Muammar Gaddafi.

He warned of tough challenges ahead in uniting the armed groups that emerged from the war, in securing arms caches and building an army, police and democratic institutions.

"This will be a long and difficult transition, but I am confident that you will succeed," the defence secretary said at a news conference after meeting interim Prime Minister Abdul Rahim Al Keeb and Defence Minister Osama Al Juwali.

The authority of Libya's interim government is being challenged by militias who took Tripoli in August, six months after the start of a rebellion against Gaddafi that drew Nato into an air war.

But Panetta indicated that the US will give more time to gain control of the militias that removed Gaddafi before determining how to help the fledgling government.

Grave visit

"The last thing you want to do is to try to impose something on a country that has just gone through what the Libyans have gone through," said Panetta on Friday before landing in Tripoli.

"They've earned the right to try to determine their future. They've earned the right to try to work their way through the issues that they are going to have to confront."

Panetta was due to visit what historians believe is the grave of 13 US sailors killed in 1804. Those deaths were caused by the explosion of the US ship Intrepid, which was slipping into Tripoli's harbour to destroy pirate ships that had captured an American frigate.

While eager to encourage a new democracy that emerged from Libya's Arab Spring revolution, the US is wary of appearing as trying to exert too much influence after an eight-month civil war. At the same time, however, leaders in the US and elsewhere worry about how well the newly-formed NTC can resolve clashes between militia groups in the North African nation.

Ahead of Panetta's visit, the Obama administration announced it had lifted sanctions the US imposed on Libya in February to choke off the Gaddafi regime's funds while it was violently suppressing peaceful protests.

Difficulties

The US at the time blocked some $37 billion (Dh135.9 billion) in Libyan assets, and a White House statement said Friday's action "unfreezes all government and central bank funds within US jurisdiction, with limited exceptions".

Recovery of the assets "will allow the Libyan government to access most of its worldwide holdings and will help the new government oversee the country's transition and reconstruction in a responsible manner", the White House said.

But the continuing violence in Libya, including recent skirmishes between revolutionary fighters and national army troops near Tripoli's airport, reflects the difficulties that Libya's leaders face as they try to forge an army, integrating some of the militias and disarming the rest.

Officials acknowledge that process could take months, and that they can't force the militias to go along. Panetta said he has seen indications that the Libyans are making progress.