WMDs

Libya officially and publicly decided to abandon its WMD programmes on 19 December 2003, after nine months of negotiations with the US and UK. Specifically, Libya pledged to:

• Eliminate all elements of its chemical and nuclear weapons programmes
• Declare all nuclear activities to the International Atomic Energy Agency
• Eliminate ballistic missiles beyond a 300km range with a payload of 500kg
• Accept international inspections to ensure Libya’s complete adherence to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which it signed in 1969 and ratified in 1975, and sign the Additional Protocol, which it did on 10 March 2004
• Eliminate all chemical weapons stocks and munitions, and accede to the Chemical Weapons Convention “without delay”
• Allow immediate inspections and monitoring to verify all of these actions

The decision earned worldwide praise, and in May 2006, the US said it was restoring ties with Libya, severed since 1980, and removing it from its list of state sponsors of terrorism.

"As a direct result of those decisions [to renounce WMDs], we have witnessed the beginning of that country's re-emergence into the mainstream of the international community," said US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. "Today marks the opening of a new era in US-Libya relations that will benefit Americans and Libyans alike."

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/2023DCE0-3983-4E25-8300-3E6A75B77A0F.htm

UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw hailed Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi as “statesmanlike and courageous.”

UK Prime Minister Tony Blair said:

“Libya’s actions entitle it to rejoin the international community.”

Ironically, given his stance and actions on Iraq, he added:

“It shows that problems of proliferation can, with good will, be tackled through discussion and engagement, to be followed up by the responsible international agencies. It demonstrates that countries can abandon programmes voluntarily and peacefully.”

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3335965.stm

The decision showed that Libya was committed to “building a world free of weapons of mass destruction and all sorts of terrorism,” said Gadhafi.

This was echoed by the UN Security Council, which recognised this as “a step towards the realisation of the goal of an Africa and a Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction and at peace,” and reaffirmed “the need to seek to resolve proliferation problems by peaceful means through political and diplomatic channels.”

http://www.nuclearfiles.org/ menu/key-issues/nuclear-weapons/ issues/proliferation/ libya/2004-04-22_security-council-welcomes-libyas-decision.html

Gadhafi’s son Saif al-Islam said:

“It will pave the way for the normalisation of political relations with the States and also with the West in general, and also will lead to eliminate any threat against Libya from the West and from the States in particular.”

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/africa/12/20/libya.main/

Libyan Prime Minister Shokri Ghanem contended that de-proliferation “is in the interests of the Libyan people and in the interest of the whole world community.” He later added:

“WMD are very costly. It’s better that we concentrate on our economic development.”

According to the Washington Post, a US source said of visits to Libya in December 2003 by MI6 and the CIA:

“The Libyans were quite open. They provided access to facilities. They provided substantial documentation about their programmes. And we were able to take samples, photographs and other evidence.”

According to IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei, who led a December 2003 inspection team to Libya, its nuclear weapons programme was in the very initial stages. The CIA said the country had made little progress in developing or acquiring a nuclear weapon.

Previously, Libya signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in November 2001 and ratified it in January 2004. In 1996, it signed the Treaty of Pelindaba, which established a nuclear-weapon-free zone in Africa.

The country acceded to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention on 19 January 1982, and placed its nuclear facilities under IAEA safeguards in 1980.

In April 2004, Libya told US officials that it plans to convert hundreds of its Scud-B missiles into short-range defensive weapons and discontinue all military trade with North Korea.

In October 2004, the US State Department announced that it had verified the complete dismantling of Libya’s WMD programmes.

http://www.nti.org/e_research/profiles/Libya/

In any case, according to Rogelio Pfirter, head of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons:

“The actual production of chemical agents was inactivated sometime in the early 1990s.”

Furthermore, British and US specialists who were invited to Libya found no concrete evidence of an ongoing biological weapons-related effort.

Dany Shoham of the Begin-Sadat Centre for Strategic Studies, Israel, says:

“Libya’s willingness to totally abandon its WMD programmes may make it a pioneer model in the Middle East.”

http://www.acronym.org.uk/dd/dd77/77libya2.htm

Anjali Bhattacharjee and Sammy Salama, research associates at the Centre for Nonproliferation Studies, say:

“The quality of Libya’s chemical, biological, and nuclear capabilities was always marginal, and Libya stands to gain a lot by abandoning its programs from a cost-benefit perspective. The United Nations has already lifted its arms embargo on Libya, and from a security standpoint Libya may well be better off concentrating on building up its conventional forces rather than diverting scarce resources into costly and militarily ineffective WMD programs.

“Libya is one of North Africa’s largest oil producers, with estimated oil reserves of 29.5 billion barrels. Even viewed from a purely economic standpoint, Libya’s abandonment of its WMD programs is a shrewd and calculated move. After all, U.S. dependence on Middle Eastern oil is matched by the dependence of various oil-producing states on their markets in the industrialized world. For this reason, mending fences with Libya will allow U.S. companies to expand their access to Libyan oil resources and possibly reduce their dependence on oil produced in the Gulf states…[I]t makes sense for American oil importers to diversify their sources of supply by expanding economic interactions” with Libya.

http://cns.miis.edu/pubs/week/031223.htm