WikiLeaks Cable Could Stir Domestic Unrest in Libya, Imperil Qaddafi - The Daily Beast
With Egypt in chaos, a new WikiLeaks cable threatens to stir unrest in Libya. The Daily Beast’s Philip Shenon reports on the bad behavior and lavish parties fueling Muammar Qaddafi's new PR problem. Plus, full coverage of the Egypt uprising. Plus, full coverage of the Egypt uprising.
Libya's neighbors are in turmoil. To the west is Tunisia. To the east is Egypt.
And with Libya's immediate neighbors convulsed by public protests over the brutality and kleptocracy of their ruling familes, a newly leaked cable from the U.S. Embassy in Libya suggests that strongman Muammar Qaddafi has created a decadent, money-hungry family dynasty that could find itself the target of the next Arab revolution in the streets.
The latest batch of American diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks includes a secret message to Washington last February from U.S. Ambassador Gene A. Cretz, who wrote that Qaddafi's family-notably, two of his especially wayward sons-had "provided enough dirt for a Libyan soap opera" and could endanger the country's stability.
The dirt, he said, included a series of alcohol-fueled New Year's Eve parties sponsored by one Qaddafi son in St. Barts-Beyoncé reportedly earned more than $1 million to perform at the party to welcome in 2010-and domestic-abuse charges against another Qaddafi son in London; he was accused of beating his wife in a London hotel suite, reportedly sending her to the hospital with a broken nose.
There are no reports of recent unrest in Libya to suggest Qaddafi might finish up like his counterparts in Tunisia-President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali and his family fled into exile this month-or in Egypt, where street protests have seized in part on allegations that President Hosni Mubarak is attempting to orchestrate an undemocratic handover of power to one of his sons.
“The widening contrast between the respectable, cultured image that Saif has taken on and the spoiled, boorish image his siblings project has local audiences rallying behind Saif as the next heir to the Qaddafi throne,” Cretz wrote.
But the allegations of corrupt dynastic politics in Libya are not much different than those of Tunisia and Egypt. And diplomats and scholars suggest Libyans may be just as angry as their Arab brethren across their border about bad behavior by their first families. Qaddafi himself seems perplexed about the chaos in the region, saying last week that President Ben Ali in Tunisia was the "victim of lies" told on the Internet and that the Tunisian should have remained in power for life.
In his February 2010 cable, Cretz wrote he had been told by a well-informed source that the Qaddafi family "has been in a tailspin lately, trying to put a stop to one rumor or another in the name of defending the family's honor." The cable's title: "Qadhafi Children Scandals Spilling Over Into Politics."
The ambassador seemed to suggest that of Qaddafi's seven biological sons, only one-38-year-old Saif, an urbane, British-educated architect who has spoken publicly of the need for democracy in his homeland-offered any hope of a smooth, dynastic transition in Libya, which Qaddafi has ruled with dictatorial powers since 1968.
"The widening contrast between the respectable, cultured image that Saif has taken on and the spoiled, boorish image his siblings project has local audiences rallying behind Saif as the next heir to the Qaddafi throne," Gretz wrote. He said that while Saif was "no stranger to the playboy lifestyle," he had "wisely distanced himself from the local drama."
The leaking of the February 2010 cable is one more reason that Cretz is unlikely to return to his post in Tripoli, the Libyan capital. He was recalled to Washington weeks ago after WikiLeaks released another of his tartly written classified cables-that one dated September 2008-that described Qaddafi's erratic behavior and detailed his foreign travels with a "voluptuous blond" Ukrainian nurse.
via thedailybeast.com