UN ends approval of foreign military intervention
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The political security commission of the upper house of parliament is demanding that the Federal Council move as quickly as possible to replace the private security firm guarding the Swiss embassy in Tripoli with a Swiss army unit. The commission said late Friday 28 October that it does not consider the current arrangement adequate; worse, it is embarrassing for the country, with an army unit ready to be deployed the moment the embassy re-opened 15 October.
The private security firm was hired because the government failed to settle a disagreement between the foreign affairs department and the defense department over how the embassy should be guarded, according to the commission.
The embassy was closed in February when the conflict in Libya began to heat up.
The United Nations said Friday it will end its authorization for foreign intervention in Libya, now that the Qaddafi regime has fallen and the transitional government is in place.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton is the latest foreign leader to visit the new regime in Tripoli, in a surprise visit from Washington Tuesday 18 October. She follows Prime Minister David Cameron of the UK and France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy. She is scheduled to meet, surrounded by tight security, National Transition Council chairman Mustafa Abdel Jalil, interim prime minister Mahmoud Jibril as well as Ali Tarhuni, the oil and finance minister.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Switzerland Thursday welcomed Libya’s new ambassador, Sliman Bouchuiguir, while announcing its own new ambassador to Libya, 49-year-old Michel Gottret, currently ambassador to Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain. Gottret will take up his new post as soon as possible, according to Bern. Switzerland is reviewing the situation in Tripoli with an eye to re-opening its embassy there, closed in early 2011 as the situation there deteriorated.
The new Swiss ambassador has a degree in physics. He entered the federal diplomatic service in 1979. He has held several posts in Bern, Paris, Copenhagen and Washington. In 2002, the Federal Council appointed him as ambassador to Algeria and Mauritania with residence in Algiers. He has held his current post since 2007.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Switzerland, along with the UN and other governments, Monday 22 August issued a call to those fighting in Libya to protect foreigners caught up in the battle, and reminded rebels that leaders who are arrested must be dealt with through the justice system. All three sons of Muammar Qaddafi have now reportedly been arrested.
Bern issued a reminder that it was among the first countries to open a humanitarian aid office in Benghazi and that it intends to continue to operate this to help alleviate civilian suffering in Libya. The Libyan National Transition Council remains the only authority Switzerland is dealing with, the Swiss Federal Foreign Affairs Department says, and it has opened a political office in Benghazi to develop working relations with the CNT.
In the UK, Prime Minister David Cameron appeared before the media, calling for the Qaddafi regime to step down immediately. Muammar Qaddafi’s whereabouts remain a mystery.
US President Barack Obama Sunday repeated his earlier calls for Qaddafi to step down, to prevent further bloodshed.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Two of the sons of Muammar Qadaffi are under arrest as rebels take over the city of Tripoli, in Libya Monday 22 August. But the man who led the country for more than 40 years has not yet been found and fighting rages on Monday morning around the Qadaffi compound in the city. The ICC has confirmed that Muammar Qadaffi’s son Saif Al-Islam, for whom it issued an arrest warrant 27 June, has been arrested. He is president of the Qadaffi International Charity and Development Foundation, a foundation registered under Swiss law.
Breaking news from Al Jazeera, BBC, CNN, Guardian, International Criminal Court/ICC
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Muammar Qaddafi, in an audio recording Monday 15 August, urged his countrymen to fight against Nato and the rebels who have launched a two-prong attack that could isolate Tripoli. This is the elder Qaddafi’s first live broadcast in several months.
Al Jazeera reports that fighting has been heavy. “Opposition fighters fought for control of the towns of Gharyan and Az-Zawiyah on Sunday, attempting to cut off the southern coastal route from Tunisia that Gaddafi uses for supplies,” it reports, noting that casualties have been high in some areas and that the government denies that the rebels have taken parts of key cities.
Links to other sites: Al Jazeera, Guardian, Xinhua
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – China’s Xinhua news agency is reporting, based on an eyewitness report, that a major fire has broken out in the Qaddafi compound in Tripoli, without further details. The agency’s reporter in Tripoli earlier reported that several major explosions rocked the city Tuesday afternoon 7 June after Nato warplanes flew over the city.
Nato 6 June said that early in the day “aircraft struck a command and control target in Tripoli, specifically a key Qadhafi regime intelligence headquarters building.
Swiss “very aware of courage” of Libyan protestors “based on experience”
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The Swiss government Monday 21 February suspended preparatory work on the tribunal it agreed to with Libya in order to ensure that two Swiss men held hostage by the Libyan government in 2010 would be freed. The announcement came as part of a message strongly condemning the Libyan government for its “targeted violence” marked by an “extreme repression” against its own citizens.
An arbitrator, Philippe Kirsch, was named only six days ago to oversee the tribunal, a sign that the long-stalled tribunal could soon get underway. It was created as a condition by Libya to free two Swiss hostages in 2010 who were taken, it is widely believed in Switzerland, in retaliation for the arrest in Geneva of Hannibal Qadaffi, one of the sons of Libya’s leader.
Swiss told to leave Libya if they can
Switzerland also told its citizens to leave Libya if possible and discouraged Swiss travellers from going to Libya, saying the outcome of the protests is uncertain. Libyan hospitals are overwhelmed and they are short of blood for necessary transfusions, according to all available evidence, Bern said in a Monday statement.
“Given its experience with the regime in Tripoli, Switzerland is very aware of the courage shown by the men and women who have taken to the streets in Libya to cry for their democratic rights,” the Swiss government notes.
Forty-six Swiss citizens are registered with the Swiss embassy in Tripoli, most of them dual nationals, and the government says it is in close contact with each of them.
AFP reports air space over Libya closed
Late Monday an Austrian army officer told news agency AFP that air space over Libya has been closed (not confirmed).
Rashid Hamdani, left who was detained but for less time, with Max Goeldi, right, at the Swiss embassy in Tripoli in 2009
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Swiss businessman Max Goeldi was released from prison in Libya Thursday 10 June, according to his lawyer, and he should be able to leave the country and return to Switzerland this weekend. He is staying in a hotel in Tripoli while paperwork for his departure is completed. TSR public television reached him at the hotel and he confirmed that he has been freed, but refused to comment otherwise. Bern has not commented either.
Goeldi is an ABB employee who has spent 692 days in prison in Libya on charges of visa irregularities, following his arrest which came soon after the arrest in Geneva of Hannibal Qadaffi, son of Libya’s leader.
Background, GenevaLunch
Rashid Hamdani, left and Max Goeldi, right, at the Swiss embassy in Tripoli in 2009
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss businessman held by Libya since July 2008, Max Goeldi, is expected to be released from prison and allowed to return home to Switzerland when he finishes his four-month prison sentence 12 June, his lawyer has told Swiss media. Only 8 of the 53 days he served in prison in July-August 2008, after his arrest, have been taken into consideration in calculating the time he has purged.
Goeldi was arrested with Rashid Hamdani, another Swiss businessman, shortly after the arrest in Geneva of Hannibal Qadaffi, son of the Libyan leader, for beating a member of his staff in a hotel.
Background, GenevaLunch
Sole survivor’s aunt and uncle arrive in Tripoli
The Dutch child who is the sole survivor of the privately-owned Afriqiyah Air crash in Tripoli 12 May, an eight-year-old named Ruben, has been joined there by his aunt and uncle. His parents and older brother were killed in the crash and while he does not have life-threatening injuries, he has had surgery for multiple fractures to the lower half of his body and he’s under sedation, reports CNN. Investigators have the flight data recorder and are studying it to determine the cause of the crash.
Meanwhile, Dutch authorities now say that the flight, from Johannisburg in South Africa to Tripoli, was carrying 70 and not 58 Dutch citizens, as earlier reported. The other nationalities on the flight: six South Africans, two Libyans, two Austrians, one German, one French person, one Zimbabwean and two British citizens but the nationalities of others have not yet been provided to media. Politicians in The Netherlands have suspended their campaigns for parliamentary elections in June, to mourn the crash victims.
Links to other sites: Aljazeera, Radio Netherlands
A relatively new Libyan airliner, an Airbus crashed Wednesday morning 12 May trying to land after a flight from South Africa to Tripoli, Libya. The flight reportedly carried 94 passengers and a crew of 11 and all appear to have died except one: a 10-year-old Dutch boy, who is in hospital but does not have life-threatening injuries.
Links to other sites: DutchNews.nl, Reuters
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Amnesty International’s Swiss branch, which has maintained contact with Swiss businessman Max Goeldi, sentenced to four months in prison in Libya for visa irregularities, is in poor condition, the group told news agency ATS Monday 15 March. His lawyer made a similar statement Sunday. Goeldi initially saw his prison detention as a temporary state while request for clemency was pending, says Amnesty, but Libya’s judicial system has not yet reviewed his case.
Goeldi’s mental state has deteriorated rapidly since he left the Swiss embassy in February, where he had been living for more than 18 months while awaiting sentencing.
Amnesty International a week ago handed Libya 14,000 signatures asking for the country to release the prisoner.
Hans-Rudolf Merz, Swiss president
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz has no regrets about his actions in the on-going disputes the country has with Libya, he says in a lengthy interview with 20Minuten, the German edition of the daily free newspaper. “I would do everything exactly the same way again.” Switzerland has been trying to obtain the release of two Swiss businessmen held in Tripoli, Libya since July 2008, after the son of Libya’s leader Muammar Qaddafi was arrested in Geneva days earlier.
Merz says he is sure the agreement he signed and the apology he gave to Libya 20 August should have freed the two men. The Swiss government announced at the time that the two would be back in Switzerland by the end of August, and sent an airplane to Tripoli to fly them home.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Details are surfacing slowly but steadily in the strange saga of the two Swiss men held by the Libyan government and Switzerland’s efforts to bring them home. The latest wrinkle is that the Swiss government has confirmed media reports from Wednesday 9 September that one of the two has had private contacts with the family of the Libyan prime minister and that he is living some 200 km from Tripoli, but reports in regularly to the Swiss embassy. The other man, ABB employee Max Goeldi, has opted to live at the embassy, and he has accepted the embassy’s offer to give him small amounts of work to do to fill his time.
Earlier media reports and government information indicated that the two men have been living at the Swiss embassy in Tripoli.
Libya is celebrating the fortieth anniversary of the coup that brought Muammar Qadaffi to power with six days of festivities to mark Revolution day, including a military parade, fireworks launched from ships off the coast, and dancing. Several African heads of state, in Tripoli for an African Union summit, are staying for the celebration. BBC
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Libya’s government has signed the contract drawn up 20 August between Switzerland and Libya, TSR, Swiss television, reports Jana, the official Libyan news agency, as saying. The Swiss Federal Council approved it earlier this week. The signing in Tripoli appears to be the final step needed for two Swiss men held in the country since July 2008 to leave. A Swiss Federal Council plane and delegation are waiting for them in Tripoli.
Related: Jana, 20 August, on the contract
One way to salvation
Update 10:50 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz signed an agreement yesterday 20 August in a surprise visit to Tripoli, Libya during which Switzerland apologized for the “unjustified and unnecessary” detention of Hannibal, the son of Libyan leader Muammar Qadaffi. This puts an end to the ongoing dispute between the two countries that was detonated by the arrest of Hannibal and his wife in a Geneva hotel room in July 2008, where they were allegedly mistreating their servants.
The agreement allows two Swiss businessmen, who had been denied exit permits, to leave Libya, and all consular and commercial ties between the two countries will resume, including commercial air links.
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Libya withdrew more than CHF5 billion in assets held in Swiss bank accounts in 2008, wire service ATS reports, in a story carried by several Swiss papers. The sharp scaledown in holdings plus the fact that the new Swiss charge d’affaires has not been able allowed to present his credentials in Tripoli could mean that Libya is carrying out threats it made in July 2008 after Hannibal Qadaffi, the son of the country’s leader, was arrested in Geneva. In October 2008 the Libyan wire service published a report saying that Libya was removing the cash it had in Swiss accounts, which it estimated to be CHF7 billion.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - A possible thaw in frosty relations between Bern and Tripoli may be in the offing, several observers have been telling Swiss media. Tensions rose between Switzerland and Libya in 2008 when the son of Muammar Qaddafi, Libya’s leader, was arrested in Geneva along with his wife for abusing a member of their staff while they were staying at the Hotel President Wilson.
Geneva sociologist and politician Jean Ziegler, who has had close contact for several years with Qadaffi, told the Tribune de Genève 3 June that there are indications an arbitration committee might be reactivated. Read more…
Geneva, Switzerland (Le Temps, Fre) – Geneva has approved a permit for a demonstration at the Place des Nations in support of two Swiss men being held in Libya. It will take place 23 April, when the Durban review conference on racism will be in full swing in Geneva. The organizer, Stephane Valent, a right-wing UDC representative for the commune of Vernier, says that Libya’s refusal to allow the two men to leave the country is racist.
