Libya - civil unrest & now NATO involvement

[classicdish]

OK, I'll be completely paranoid here and speculate that the Chinese government has used it's cyber-warfare assets to take out all the Twitter servers ahead of nation-wide protests on Sunday by anonymous online activists. (PS This speculation is based on no evidence whatsoever, I don't know how twitter works or if people even use it in china. The sunday protest stuff is real however).

 

[elbows]

Who knows. Twitter nearly loaded once for me today, but certainly the outage seems a bit different to what normally happens when twitter overloads (twitter site is usually still available but normally has a graphic saying sorry we are overloaded).

China is always an obvious one on the list of potential perpetrators in cyber warfare, but as events in Libya reached a new point for western powers last night (most overt evacuations over and likely to move to an SAS etc phase for rescuing others in the desert) I cannot rule out it being the work of other powers. Although given the relative lack of twitter users within Libya/flakey internet there, this doesnt seem like the most likely explanation.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Yes, we are winning in Tripoli:

2.58pm: Libya Gaddafi's security forces have abandoned parts of Tripoli, where protesters now openly defy the regime, Reuters reports.

The withdrawal of security forces from the working-class Tajoura district after five days of anti-government demonstrations leaves Gaddafi's grip on power looking tenuous, says the news agency.

Residents say troops killed at least five people overnight when they opened fire on protesters trying to march from Tajoura to the central Green Square. The number could not be independently confirmed.

A funeral on Saturday morning for one of the victims turned into another show of defiance against Gaddafi. "Everyone in Tajoura came out against the government. We saw them killing our people here and everywhere in Libya," Ali, aged 25, told Reuters.

"We will demonstrate again and again, today, tomorrow, the day after tomorrow until they change."

 

[classicdish]

Twitter has been OK for me for several hours today but has now fallen over. I googled around and people are having problems in Ireland and the US as well.

Re. lack of internet/twitter users in Libya - a lot of the #feb17 organised info is first getting out via phone calls (or even USB memory sticks into Tunisia/Egypt) and then being translated into english and tweeted by Libyan activists outside the country. Within the country people are using mobile phones and landlines to talk to each other directly as I don't think the masses of people have internet access anyway.

The worse case scenario is that all Libyan mobiles networks and landlines going down and staying off, in which case people would have to try and find satellite phones, try and connect via Egyptian and Tunisian mobile networks near the borders or send stuff out on USB / memory cards.

UK and US based activists can use blogs, facebook & forums, can contact AlJazeera etc and so forth ... but losing Twitter means having to 'reconnect' to various people thereby losing a hours/days in the process, means there isn't one central #hashtag sorting house, makes it harder to text in comments from mobiles etc.

EDIT: Twitter's back for me

 

[elbows]

Yay twitter is indeed back

OK that Libyan government jet that we talked about last night continued to be delayed for a long time, but as of 3 or 4 hours ago it was in the air in the Budapest area, heading for Tripoli. Given the situation in Libya, with Gaddafi's days almost certain numbered, we may expect it to be used to take family out of the country, and possibly even the man himself, though who knows where it could take them. Or maybe not, all speculation really but in the absence of much other news I may as well try to keep an eye on it.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

***

 

[elbows]

Put it on the Tunisia thread!

On a related note in Libya:

1545: Libyan TV says in an "urgent" screen caption the state news agency is under "piracy" attack, and gives a new web address: "Website of [state] al-Jamahiriyah News Agency (JANA) subjected to suspicious piracy operation", reports BBC Monitoring.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

The rebels in Misrata seem to have captured a high-ranking officer, Brig Gen Abu Bakr Ali in Misrata

 

[elbows]

There are some reports on twitter that Gaddafi's regime have tried to do a deal with Misurata and Azzintan locations/tribes but were rebuffed. Regime must surely realise they are fucked now.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

There's a lot of rumours going around about the Algerian authorities providing support to Gadaffi - organising the mercs and even having special forces on the ground

 

[elbows]

Well if there is any outside assistance they have been shit so far!

 

[elbows]

WSJ reports that Gaddafi's nurse, who featured in some wikileaks, is going home according to her daughter:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB100...ews&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

 

[London_Calling]

The time to rejoice will be when his personal beautician leaves, you know it's over at that point.

 

[dylans]

Good article here on the historical ignorance and colonial minded arrogance of those in the West calling for "intervention in Libya

Now, having learned nothing from the horrors that they cheer-led like excitable teenage girls over the past 15 years, these bohemian bombers, these latte-sipping lieutenants, these iPad imperialists are back. This time they’re demanding the invasion of Libya.

In the Guardian Ian Birrell brushes aside the eight-year nightmare of Iraq in one sentence – we shouldn’t be "scarred by the foolishness of the Iraq invasion", he says – as he calls on the international community to spearhead a "rapid intervention" to save the people of Libya. It’s like an "apocalyptic Hollywood film" and there are even "rumours of systematic male rape", he says, proving once again that there is no situation so bad that it cannot be made to sound even worse by hacks seeking to emotionally blackmail NATO into dropping a couple of tonnes of bombs.

The ignorance of liberal interventionists is captured in the fact that they seem to have wilfully forgotten the disastrous interventions of the past 15 years, all of which, from Yugoslavia to Afghanistan to Iraq, exacerbated local tensions and led to more, not less, bloodshed.

It takes a special kind of arrogance to be able to demand yet another international military venture when the terrible consequences of your last one are still plain to see. And their narcissism is contained in the fact that the real reason they are making these demands for war is to make themselves feel good, to demonstrate that they care with a capital C. They know nothing of the countries that they want to see invaded, and care little about the potential of such invasions to destabilise things further. No, all that matters is that in saying "Forget Iraq, let’s now attack Gaddafi!", they can publicly demonstrate their own moral indefatigability.

Yes, what is happening in Libya is of great cause for concern. But it is also exciting. A people is liberating itself, city by city, and in the process is creating the foundations for a new kind of society and even a potential democracy. To invade now in order to satisfy Western politicians’ and hacks’ lust for a bit of purpose in their humdrum lives would be to turn this fledgling democracy into a moral protectorate of the West – and store up more war for the future.

http://www.uruknet.info/?p=m75353&hd&size=1&l=e&fb=1

 

[Lock&Light]

The time to rejoice will be when his personal beautician leaves, you know it's over at that point.

Judging from the way he looks I'd have thought that his personal beautician left long ago.

 

[likesfish]

don't think RAF Chinooks can be refueled in mid air the cock up of the hc3 fiasco saw to that the KC135 being a huge jet based on a Boeing 707 and a Chinook top speed less than 200mph its probably their to keep the spy plane in the air while the Chinooks make the relatively slow journey in to get the peeps in the desert. getting the spy-plane to give some advance warning if anyone in a fast jet decides to take an interest.

 

[London_Calling]

Judging from the way he looks I'd have thought that his personal beautician left long ago.

You may not have noticed the dyed daily chin stubble.

 

[TheHoodedClaw]

Looks like the RAF got 150 civilians out of the desert. Used 2 Hercules.

 

[quimcunx]

There are some reports on twitter that Gaddafi's regime have tried to do a deal with Misurata and Azzintan locations/tribes but were rebuffed. Regime must surely realise they are fucked now.

I've had twitter down too and then been out but when it came back there was a bit of chatter making ref to negotiators being sent out. I wondered if this was a. had happened b. was rumoured and repeated or c. picked up from something Saif has said, and either had happened or was rumoured to be happening, or he had lied to say it was happening. This will be Saif's initiative I guess, with him being good cop to his dad's bad cop.

Also lots of chatter about the roads to Tripoli and dangers therein.

A few tweeps talking of their friends/family being attacked or even killed too. I was looking through last night and a couple haven't tweeted for a few days, one of them in Sirt. I hope they just haven't had internet access.

Surely Algeria would be holding onto their own mercenaries in case they need them themselves.



Is it implausible that int'l private military companies have organised them?

Also I so happened to pass Trafalgar Sq today but saw no demo. I guess it stayed at the Embassy.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Looks like the RAF got 150 civilians out of the desert. Used 2 Hercules.

And now they have closed the British Embassy

 

[elbows]

There are more reports of Gaddafi trying to arm & bribe people in certain locations, this time Kufra, without success.

Fresh reports of protests in Tripoli, people possibly heading for Green Square, not much detail as usual. And thats probably the safest way considering the regime likely monitor info coming via the net.

Also reports that Wazin on the border with Tunisia has joined the people.

iyad_elbaghdadi on twitter is the source for this info, increasingly he seems like the one best able to report news, others seem largely reduced to posting links to videos and stuff from other net sources, which is still useful but is a diminished capability compared to some days ago.

 

[elbows]

By the way twitter user @libyaleaks is the most obvious regime crony or true believer speaking in English on twitter these days, claims to be a uk citizen teaching out there.

edit - just notice they say they have left Tripoli the other day but they continue to report that friends say all is well out there. I'm tempted to abuse them on twitter but I dont think I can be bothered right now.

 

[quimcunx]

Avaaz are appealing for donations to help blackout proof the uprising spreading across the middle east.

Avaaz is working urgently to "blackout-proof" the protests -- with secure satellite modems and phones, tiny video cameras, and portable radio transmitters, plus expert support teams on the ground -- to enable activists to broadcast live video feeds even during internet and phone blackouts.

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/blackout_proof_the_protests_9/?cl=959088166&v=8479

Not quite sure how they would decide who to give them to, but I think it's a creditable response to attacks on communications between locked down countries and the outside world.

 

[Idris2002]

I've had twitter down too and then been out but when it came back there was a bit of chatter making ref to negotiators being sent out. I wondered if this was a. had happened b. was rumoured and repeated or c. picked up from something Saif has said, and either had happened or was rumoured to be happening, or he had lied to say it was happening. This will be Saif's initiative I guess, with him being good cop to his dad's bad cop.

Also lots of chatter about the roads to Tripoli and dangers therein.

A few tweeps talking of their friends/family being attacked or even killed too. I was looking through last night and a couple haven't tweeted for a few days, one of them in Sirt. I hope they just haven't had internet access.

Surely Algeria would be holding onto their own mercenaries in case they need them themselves.



Is it implausible that int'l private military companies have organised them?

Also I so happened to pass Trafalgar Sq today but saw no demo. I guess it stayed at the Embassy.

Yesterday's Liberation had a story on the African mercs. It appears that a lot of them are Chadians and Tuaregs who can't go back to their home countries, and who were promised Libyan citizenships by MG. And as I suspected, it's not good news for the million African guestworkers in Libya.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

iyad_elbaghdadi on twitter is the source for this info, increasingly he seems like the one best able to report news, others seem largely reduced to posting links to videos and stuff from other net sources, which is still useful but is a diminished capability compared to some days ago.

He's tweeting that fresh demonstrations are breaking out again in Tripoli

 

[quimcunx]

iyad_elbaghdadi on twitter is the source for this info, increasingly he seems like the one best able to report news, others seem largely reduced to posting links to videos and stuff from other net sources, which is still useful but is a diminished capability compared to some days ago.

I wonder who is source is, as he's not there himself? They seem to have broader info than would be available by someone who can only say what they've seen or been told by their mates/family has seen.

I saw someone say there are a few more people tweeting from there now and one complaining about, a RL friend I think, who is defending gadafi and they have now blocked.

I'm surprised it's taken so long for gadafi cronies to get on there. Or maybe I just made my first list early and missed them.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

I get the impression that the regime is trying to open up other fronts in towns previously lost to the opposition which explains why they are giving out guns to sympathetic elements in Tripoli as they are low in man power

 

[quimcunx]

Yesterday's Liberation had a story on the African mercs. It appears that a lot of them are Chadians and Tuaregs who can't go back to their home countries, and who were promised Libyan citizenships by MG. And as I suspected, it's not good news for the million African guestworkers in Libya.

Have you got a link? I don't really get that. do you mean they were in Libya already, presumably then, as guestworkers? Have there been reports of guestworkers saying they've been approached?

 

[Tankus]

Oil camps are wide open ...... workers even had their clothes stolen ..along with vehicles laptops etc

Libya's only got 5 major refineries, with only one fairly modern (1984) so if he does blow these as well as the well heads .....
Easy to blow a refinery , they are like unexploded primed bombs ..you could do it with a few mortar rounds

According to OGJ, Libya has five domestic refineries, with a combined capacity of 378,000 bbl/d. Libya's refineries include:
1) the Ras Lanuf export refinery, completed in 1984 and located on the Gulf of Sirte, with a crude oil refining capacity of 220,000 bbl/d;
2) the Az Zawiya refinery, completed in 1974 and located in northwestern Libya, with crude processing capacity of 120,000 bbl/d;
3) the Tobruk refinery, with crude capacity of 20,000 bbl/d;
4) Sarir, a topping facility with 10,000 bbl/d of capacity; and
5) Brega, the oldest refinery in Libya, located near Tobruk with crude capacity of 8,000 bbl/d.
Libya's refining sector was impacted by UN sanctions, specifically UN Resolution 883 of November 11, 1993, which banned Libya from importing refinery equipment. Libya is seeking a comprehensive upgrade to its entire refining system, with a particular aim of increasing output of gasoline and other light products.

http://www.eia.doe.gov/cabs/Libya/Oil.html

So if he is going to scorch earth ..... It should not take the new regime too long to get back to export

 

[elbows]

The refineries are likely to be of more use to the Libyans own domestic supplies rather than exports which are probably unrefined in many cases.

As for the camps, I get the impression that some of the camps we have been hearing about where British workers were, are to do with exploration rather than existing mass production.