Gaddafi’s desperate bid to save regime revealed

The Gaddafi regime carried out an extraordinary clandestine lobbying operation to try to stop Nato’s bombardment of Libya, and believed the western allies were likely to launch a full-scale invasion in “either late September or October”.

Secret documents in Tripoli seen by the Guardian reveal the desperate attempts made by the Libyan government in its final months to influence US and world opinion. It approached key international opinion formers from the US president Barack Obama downwards.

The regime tried to persuade the Democratic congressman Dennis Kucinich – a well-known rebel who voted against Nato military action in Libya, and opposed the Iraq war – to visit Tripoli as part of a hastily arranged “peace mission”. The Libyan government offered to pay all Kucinich’s costs related to the trip, including “travel expenses and accommodation”.

On 22 June a letter sent to Libya’s prime minister, Al-Baghdadi Ali al-Mahmoudi, by a US-based lobbyist for the regime, Sufyan Omeish, noted that Kucinich was “concerned that his personal safety in Tripoli could not be guaranteed”. He preferred to conduct meetings with regime officials outside Libya. The plan was for Kucinich to meet “senior Libyan officials, including Gaddafi”. The proposed trip never took place. Kucinich visited Syria instead.

He confirmed the invitation and said he had discussed it directly with the Libyan prime minister, but ultimately declined because of security concerns.

“Because of the efforts I had made early on to bring an end to the war, I started to get calls from Libya, including from the prime minister,” the congressman told the Guardian. “He had taken note of the fact I was making an effort to put forward a peace proposal. I had several requests to go to Libya. I made it clear I could not negotiate on behalf of the administration. I said I was speaking as a member of Congress involved in the issue and willing to listen to what they had to say. But given that Libyan was under attack, it did not seem a promising place to hold meetings.”

He said that on one occasion he held an hour-long telephone conversation with the prime minister. He also confirmed Omeish had been in touch, acting as an intermediary for and supporter of the regime.

On 23 June the prime minister – who has since fled to Tunisia – wrote a surprisingly sycophantic letter to Obama. He addressed him as “Mr President”, and politely complained about Washington’s “unprecedented decision” to confiscate the Libyan regime’s assets – “to please” the rebels. He also wrote to leading members of the US Congress, chiding Republican John Boehner after he described a letter by Gaddafi as “incoherent”.

The documents surfaced in a city still subject to a power struggle between rebel fighters and remnants of Gaddafi’s security forces, who exchanged fire for much of the day around a cluster of multi-storey blocks of flats in north Tripoli, the site of a last stand by some loyalists.

Rebels also closed in on pro-Gaddafi strongholds in Sirte and Sabha.

Last night the opposition National Transitional Council (NTC) consolidated its control when Ali Tarhouni, the finance minister of the NTC cabinet, told a press conference the cabinet is moving immediately to Tripoli from the eastern city of Benghazi. The NTC also scored a significant diplomatic victory when a Security Council committee last night agreed to unblock $1.5bn (£921m) in Libyan funds that had been frozen since the start of the conflict. The money will be used to pay for humanitarian supplies, basic services in Libyan cities, and salaries for civil servants, police and soldiers who have not been paid in months. The agreement to unblock the funds followed negotiations between the US and South Africa, which had initially opposed the move.

As the NTC was bolstered by these announcements, other secrets of the 42-year regime emerged. The NTC leader, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, said his forces had found huge supplies of food, medicine and fuel secretly stockpiled by the regime. He claimed there was enough food to feed a city twice the size of Tripoli and enough medicine for the entire country for a year.

There was also evidence that both sides may have carried out executions. An international medical worker said 17 bodies found in Gaddafi’s fortified compound, Bab al-Aziziya, were of civilians executed there in the last days of the regime. Reuters meanwhile reported finding 30 bodies of pro-Gaddafi fighters with multiple bullet wounds, at least two of which had been bound with plastic handcuffs, suggesting they too had been executed.

Gaddafi’s furtive global lobbying took place as the increasingly paranoid regime believed the US was planning to invade. On 28 June, Omeish, a US-based film maker, warned that the US Senate’s decision to extend US involvement in Libya for another year paved the way for a ground assault.

The letter to Baghdadi is marked “highly important and strictly confidential”. It says: “It is clear that the Nato coalition forces have no intention of ending their military campaign over Libya anytime soon … What is most concerning is that there are highly credible analysts and intelligence personnel in the United States who are exposing growing evidence of covert logistical military planning for a future ground invasion in either late September or October of this year.”

He then discusses an urgent proposed peace mission to Libya to try to sway international opinion in their favour. He writes: “We have already obtained confirmation of the involvement of a high-profile US congressman to participate … and are making additional overtures to obtain further congressional involvement from other members.

“Moreover, we have also obtained a new confirmation from a high-profile Princeton professor of international law and a former UN fact-finding commissioner to join our delegation.” Omeish boasted that he was also working with “award-winning/Oscar-nominated filmmakers to help document the truth about Libya … to ensure maximum world-wide exposure.”

In another message, Omeish urges Baghdadi not to communicate via Gmail, but to use a more secure private account.

His invasion warning was sent to Almois Ben Ismail, Baghdadi’s private secretary. The Libyan government’s PR offensive had a spectacular lack of success, with Nato continuing its UN-backed air strikes, and rebels sweeping into Tripoli on Sunday. Omeish did not reply to an email seeking comment.

The correspondence seen by the Guardian reveals that the Libyan government was surprisingly well informed – even if its sources were sometimes egregiously inaccurate. Baghdadi’s personal papers include copies of the WikiLeaks documents concerning Libya, written by the US ambassador Gene Cretz. Cretz was forced to leave Libya after mentioning Gaddafi’s “voluptuous” Ukrainian nurse. Someone had carefully annotated the English original with Arabic.

Baghdadi also had a copy of a letter written by US senator John McCain to Mahmoud Jibril, the chairman of the executive board of the NTC which had been intercepted by the regime. In it, McCain urged Jibril to stop human rights abuses by the rebels, following reports of reprisals including looting, house-burning and beatings against government supporters.

McCain tells Jibril he is a “friend and supporter”. But he says the rebels must behave in “positive contrast” to the cruel Gaddafi regime.

The papers list the “talking points” Libyan representatives need to make in their conversations with international partners, specifically to claim that the revolution in Libya is not a popular uprising but the work of al-Qaida cells.

The documents also include occasional glimpses of friction within the regime. One letter complains about Moussa Ibrahim, Gaddafi’s media spokesman, one of the key protagonists of the Libya conflict until his disappearance 24 hours ago.

Baghdadi complains that Ibrahim briefed CNN about US-Libyan negotiations in June without consulting him or Libya’s minister for media. Another paper details the sacking of two Libyan diplomats in Tunisia, presumably for political disloyalty.

Gaddafi’s own missives also feature. The prime minister had a copy of the vanished Libyan leader’s rambling appeal to the US congress and senate, in which he expressed his unhappiness about the US’s participation in the “aggression against Libya”.

Gaddafi blamed the crisis on France. He said that he had been “keen for years to establish a special relationship with the US”. He also modestly denied playing a leading role in Libyan affairs, and claimed to have left power in 1977.

“I do not have any formal position, not even the powers of the Queen of Britain,” he insisted.

Hurricane Irene threatens to plunge US

The entire sweep of the US coast from North Carolina to New England was warned of widespread power outages and public transport shutdowns in the face of a hurricane of historic magnitude at the weekend.

As hurricane Irene began to bear down on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, bringing heavy rain and 9ft waves before its expected landfall early on Saturday, officials warned residents of some of the most densely populated parts of the country they could lose some of the essentials of modern life.

The New York City mayor, Michael Bloomberg, told a press conference that the authorities would begin shutting down the subway system from Saturday – for the first time in its history.

Meanwhile, officials warned of widespread power black-outs – potentially lasting for days or even weeks in rural areas – because of high winds from the hurricane.

As many as 65 million people could be in harm’s way as hurricane Irene begins its slow crawl along the entire east coast.

Irene was downgraded to a category two storm early on Friday, with 105mph winds, but authorities said repeatedly it would be folly for people on its path to think they were in the clear. As meteorologists warned them, for people on the east coast, this was the storm of their lifetimes.

“All indications point to this being a historic hurricane,” Barack Obama said in a statement from Martha’s Vineyard. The island is also on hurricane watch and Obama was expected to cut short his holiday by a day. “If you are in the path of this hurricane, you have to take precautions now,” he said. “Don’t wait, don’t delay.”

If it follows its present trajectory, Irene will be the biggest storm to strike on the east coast since 2005, making its first landfall in North Carolina early on Saturday morning. The storm will then lumber up the coast, bringing high winds and flooding to Washington DC, Baltimore, Maryland, Philadelphia, Atlantic City, New Jersey, Long Island, New York, and Boston, Massachusetts.

The primary concern of meteorologists was the danger of storm surges – with 11ft high waves predicted in North Carolina. Parts of New Jersey and New York City were also at risk. Those threats were magnified by the extraordinary breadth of the storm system. Max Mayfield, a former director of the national hurricane centre, called a storm on such a scale his “greatest nightmare”.

“This is going to be a real challenge … There’s going to be millions of people affected,” he told reporters.

By mid-morning on Friday, the authorities were warning that time was running out for people to evacuate safely.

They said the aftershocks of Hurricane Irene – power outages, downed trees, flooding – could be felt for days, weeks or longer.

“It’s going to be a huge geographical area with lots of people affected,” Elizabeth McGovern, president of the Red Cross, told a press conference. “From a time perspective this could take weeks maybe even months to respond to.”

The authorities also pleaded with people not to take comfort from the downgrading of the hurricane. Irene could still inflict severe damage well inland. “It does not mean that there will not be damages. It does not mean there will not be power outages,” Craig Fugate, the director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told the press conference.

Governors in every state from North Carolina to Massachusetts declared states of emergency. Mandatory evacuation orders were declared in low-lying and coastal areas most in harms’ way.

“As governor of this state, I want to tell you: this hurricane is real. It is coming our way,” said North Carolina’s governor, Bev Perdue. Eleven counties in the state have made disaster preparations.

Flights and trains were cancelled, and travellers warned they would face further delays and the possibility of blocked tunnels and bridges if they waited until Saturday to evacuate.

Outdoor concerts were cancelled and major league baseballs games rescheduled. Students at several small colleges were told not to report to their dorm rooms.

In Virginia, the US navy took 27 ships and submarines out of its Norfolk base and dispatched them to the north. Meanwhile, the air force shifted more than 70 aircraft from bases along the east coast to Ohio.

In the northern Virginia suburbs around Washington DC, the authorities began distributing sandbags in the event of flooding and a storm surge from the Potomac river.

Maryland’s governor, Martin O’Malley, warned residents in beach towns they could be forcibly removed by police if they ignored evacuation orders. “It is the height of selfishness not to evacuate,” he told CNN.

Authorities in New York City cancelled construction permits for the weekend, and drew up evacuation plans for low-lying, costal areas of New York city including Coney Island in Brooklyn, Battery Park City in Lower Manhattan and parts of Staten Island, said the mayor, Mike Bloomberg.

Bloomberg urged able-bodied people in low-lying areas to evacuate and said a decision about wider evacuations would be made Saturday morning. He said said officials had to “assume the worst, prepare for that and hope for the best”. The city evacuated a nursing home and residents were urged to stock up on groceries and flashlights and prepare for potential evacuations.

The police commissioner Ray Kelly said rowing boats were being sent to police precincts in flood-prone areas. Forestry contractors have been hired to deal with fallen trees.

The city is preparing to shut down its transit system as early as Saturday. Nursing homes in low-lying areas began evacuation residents on Friday/.

Events including a concert by the Dave Matthews Band on Governors’ Island have been postponed, street fairs and other outdoor activities have been scrapped to clear the streets for emergency vehicles.

In New Jersey, traffic helicopters showed pictures of long lines of cars streaming out of Atlantic City. Holidaymakers began leaving Fire Island, the 32-mile barrier island off the Atlantic coast of Long Island. A mandatory evacuation of barrier islands in Cape May county, New Jersey, began on Friday.

New Jersey governor Chris Christie said wider evacuations were being considered. “If I order it, I expect it to be complied with,” he said. “Let me assure you, we are not overreacting.”

UN offices bombing in Nigeria

A car loaded with explosives crashed into the main United Nations’ building in Nigeria’s capital and exploded Friday, killing at least 18 people in one of the deadliest assaults on the international body in a decade.

A radical Muslim sect blamed for a series of attacks in the country claimed responsibility for the bombing, a major escalation of its sectarian fight against Nigeria’s weak central government.

The brazen assault in a neighbourhood surrounded by heavily fortified diplomatic posts represented the first suicide attack to target foreigners in oil-rich Nigeria, where people already live in fear of the radical Boko Haram sect. The group, which has reported links to al-Qaida, wants to implement a strict version of Shariah law in the nation and is vehemently opposed to Western education and culture.

While police officers and local officials have primarily bore the brunt of Boko Haram’s rage, now everyone seems to be a target in a nation often divided by religion and ethnicity.

Car rammed through gates

“It is an attack on the global community,” said Viola Onwuliri, a junior Nigerian foreign minister, as she looked at the bomb site.

A sedan loaded with explosives crashed through two gates at the exit of the United Nations compound Friday morning as guards tried in vain to stop it, witnesses told The Associated Press. The suicide bomber inside drove the car through the glass front of the main reception area of the building and detonated the explosives, inflicting the most damage possible, a spokesman for the Nigerian National Emergency Management Agency said.

“I saw scattered bodies,” said Michael Ofilaje, a UNICEF worker at the four-story building, which he said shook with the explosion. “Many people are dead.”

At least 18 people died in the attack, according to an AP survey of morgues at four major Abuja hospitals. Nigerian Health Minister Mohammad Ali Pate made a public appeal for blood donations, saying there were at least 60 injured people alone at the nearby National Hospital.

‘Terrible act’

The headquarters, known as U.N. House, had offices for about 400 employees working for 26 U.N. humanitarian and development agencies.

Authorities worked Friday to account for everyone in the building at the time of the blast. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called the car bombing “an assault on those who devote their lives to helping others.” “We condemn this terrible act, utterly,” Ban told reporters at U.N. headquarters. “We do not yet have precise casualty figures but they are likely to be considerable. A number of people are dead; many more are wounded.”

Said Djinnit, the special representative of the U.N. secretary-general for West Africa, told the AP that he expects the casualties are mostly local staff.

The attack was one of the deadliest attacks on the United Nations in a decade. Seventeen U.N. civilian staff members were killed along with dozens of others in two terrorist car bombings that targeted U.N. and other premises in Algiers on Dec. 11, 2007. Friday’s bombing also came just days after the U.N. marked the eighth anniversary of the Aug. 19, 2003 bombing of U.N. headquarters in Baghdad that killed 15 U.N. staff including top envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello and seven others.

‘Heinous action’

The attack was also condemned by leaders around the world and members of the U.N. Security Council who individually deplored the targeting of the U.N. at an open meeting on U.N. peacekeeping.

U.S. President Barack Obama called the attack “horrific and cowardly” and expressed strong support for the U.N.’s work.

“The people who serve the United Nations do so with a simple purpose: to try to improve the lives of their neighbours and promote the values on which the U.N. was founded — dignity, freedom, security, and peace,” Obama said in a statement. “An attack on Nigerian and international public servants demonstrates the bankruptcy of the ideology that led to this heinous action.”

The explosion punched a huge hole in the building, located in the same neighbourhood as the U.S. embassy and other diplomatic posts in Abuja. Workers brought three large cranes to the site within hours of the attack, trying to pull away the concrete and rubble to find survivors.

‘Counter-Strike: Global Offensive’

Valve worked up the first-person shooter crowd with the announcement of “Counter-Strike: Global Offensive” a couple weeks ago, but it amounted to little more than an acknowledgement of the project’s existence. Well, PAX Prime is set to kick off today, and with it, fans will have their first chance to check out the next installment in the iconic series for themselves. Thankfully, for those of us who lack the fortitude to withstand the stank of the convention halls, Valve has just released an official trailer.

Check it out right after the jump.

Somewhat predictably, the video goes through the history of the “Counter-Strike” franchise, welling up feelings of nostalgia in your insides that sort of say, “you’re buying this, sucker.” Honestly, if you’re a “Counter-Strike” fan, this game is a no brainer, but I can’t say the new trailer really knocked me for a loop. Sure, I’m excited when I see clips of “Counter-Strike 1.6” or “CS: Source,” but the footage of “Global Offensive” doesn’t look all that groundbreaking.

More specifically, “CS:GO” looks an awful lot like every other incarnation of “Counter-Strike,” but with a visual overhaul; a graphical touch-up that doesn’t look all that impressive at this point. I’m not saying the game looks like garbage – plus it’s still early – but I would have expected a little more from Valve.

Over at Kotaku, Stephen Totilo took the game for a ride, and despite some some new weaponry and gameplay options, “CS:GO” is definitely loyal to franchise fans. The game will feature seven classic maps, including dust, dust_2 (a personal favorite), aztec, nuke, inferno, Italy, and office. There are also eight new weapons and devices, including a decoy grenade, a molotov cocktail, the IMI Negev, a taser gun (sounds fun), a Tec-9, a Mag-7, a sawn-off shotgun, and the PP-Bizon.

In an effort to draw in new players, “CS:GO” will include a new “casual” mode. While playing on casual settings, you don’t have to worry about the cost of weapons, and very likely, it’s a nice stepping-off point for those new to the series. If you’re a hardcore veteran, you’ll probably go right into the more traditional “competitive” mode, where you’ll find the usual “Counter-Strike” gameplay.

Valve have also mentioned that they while they will host their own servers, you’ll still have the ability to host your very own. Players on PlayStation 3 will enjoy cross-platform play with PC and Mac players, thanks to SteamWorks. Furthermore, PlayStation 3 players will have the opportunity to play with a mouse and keyboard, which is completely great. Honestly, where are you on this, Microsoft?

There’s still no mention of pricing for the download-only “Counter-Strike: Global Offensive,” but you can look forward to diving in sometime early next year.