The Arab Spring and "the War on Terror"

[The_Rev]

Unconfirmed reports that the rebels have taken Tripoli and that Gadaffi is dead.

[TheDon]

Reports have been corrected to say he's still alive.

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

I'd be surprised if he was still in Tripoli, or Libya for that matter.

[TrentVilla]

Nobody knows where he is, he hasn't been seen in quite some time I believe.

They have though got two of his son's.

[peterms]

They have though got two of his son's.

His son's what? Finish the sentence, for ****'s sake.

[Meath_Villan]

any chance of a bullet for the lockerbie bomber ?

[Awol]

Has any one else noticed that we've spent the last 30 years fighting over tea towels and sheep?

Pretty crazy really.

[privateer]

They have though got two of his son's.

His son's what? Finish the sentence, for ****'s sake.

:notworthy:

I'm amazed there hasn't been more action on this thread considering what has already happened. The denouement of the Libyan civil war and it is almost passing on here like the conclusion of an inter-tribal spat in the ranges of New Guinea. Most strange.

[BrownsVillan]

Not surprisingly here is the preamble to the new Libyan Transitional Constitution

“Islam is the Religion of the State, and the principal source of legislation is Islamic Jurisprudence (Sharia).” - Part 1, Article 1 of the Libyan Draft Constitutional Charter for the Transitional Stage.

Link

[chrisp65]

Got to be fair, the General Krulak vs Gadaffi international hide and seek final is going to the wire....

[TrentVilla]

Got to be fair, the General Krulak vs Gadaffi international hide and seek final is going to the wire....

That made me chuckle.

[villadude]

any chance of a bullet for the lockerbie bomber ?

I'll go along with that

[TrentVilla]

Right so that is Libya **** for the next 20 years.

Next?

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

The revolutionary wave will go south and all sorts of shit will hit the fan, that's what is next.

Not before Syrians get slaughtered en masse for the next few weeks though (like what happened in well...the past few weeks too), the very thing we claimed to have prevented in Libya.

[TrentVilla]

Head's Niger or tails Chad....

[LondonLax]

Not surprisingly here is the preamble to the new Libyan Transitional Constitution

“Islam is the Religion of the State, and the principal source of legislation is Islamic Jurisprudence (Sharia).” - Part 1, Article 1 of the Libyan Draft Constitutional Charter for the Transitional Stage.

Link

Part two of that draft on various rights and freedoms should balance the dodgy aspects of Sharia law.

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

We'll have to sit and wait on that one.

I remain skeptical that a country can claim to be democratic, equal and free and then have any religion as a state religion (and laws subsequently derived from it).

[snowychap]

Beware of celebratory gunfire.

How dangerous is celebratory gunfire? Legions of victims know but cannot tell

Bullets fired up always come down – often with fatal results – so war reporters are wise to wear helmets, even in a friendly throng

Without doubt, war correspondents are wise to wear helmets and flak jackets while sending dispatches from shell-pounded streets crackling with gunfire.

But when Sky News reporter Alex Crawford rode into Tripoli this week on a rebel pickup truck, she was more worried about celebratory gunfire – because of the danger posed by bullets landing on her head.

While some early studies conjectured that bullets shot upwards simply vanished into space, the threat from falling ordnance is not to be dismissed.

To explore the finer details of the rule that what goes up must come down, Benjamin Robins reported in 1761 that a largebore bullet fired upwards returned to Earth three quarters of a mile away and half a minute later. More precise studies followed.

In the autumn of 1910, an RL Tippins hauled a Maxim machine gun to the tidal mud of the river Stour in Suffolk and fired two bursts of about 30 bullets straight up into the air.

With stopwatch in hand, he timed the bullets as they fell to Earth, recording flight times of about 55 seconds.

The conclusion from the experiments was that the bullets reached 2,750 metres (9,000ft), taking 19 seconds to rise and almost twice as long – 36 seconds – to fall.

Recalling the experiment, Tippins said: "We had no head cover, but trusted to the wind to carry them away far enough to miss us."

But what do we know today of the risk of injury from falling bullets?

Between 1985 and 1992, a group of physicians at the Martin Luther King/Drew medical centre in Los Angeles studied victims of gunshot wounds and identified 118 thought to have been hit by falling bullets. These included people struck by bullets while going about their everyday business, far away from known gunfire.

Only six of the regular bullets were traced by the police, to shootings that occurred up to a mile away. But some people were hit by high velocity rounds whose sources were never traced.

For those hit by falling bullets, the chance of the wound being fatal was far higher than a typical shooting. The hospital put deaths from regular shootings between 2% and 6%, while for those struck by falling bullets the death rate was close to one third.

The reason was simple – those unlucky enough to be hit by falling shells were more likely to be struck on the head, and while the bullets were travelling slower after being shot into the sky, they were still capable of smashing skulls.

According to the doctors, a spent bullet falls back to Earth with a speed of between 90 and 180 metres per second. A bullet travelling at less than 60 metres per second can cause a fatal skull injury, they added.

The hazard posed by celebratory shots led Los Angeles city council to ban the firing of bullets into the air in 1989. Later, sales of bullets in the runup to New Year's Eve were prohibited.

The issue was picked up in 2003 by the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, which raised alarm over the dangers of falling bullets discharged during new year celebrations in Puerto Rico in 2003/4. They logged 19 injuries, including one death, over two days.

The perils of falling bullets are not confined to war zones and inner cities. In 2008, American chef Paul Prudhomme was setting up his cooking tent on a golf range ahead of the PGA tour in New Orleans when he flinched from what he thought was a bee sting.

When he shook his shirt sleeve, a .22 calibre bullet dropped out. According to police, it could have been fired one and a half miles away. Prudhomme continued to cook with a hole in his chef's coat and a cut to his arm.

The danger of falling bullets, from celebrations linked to New Year's Eve, weddings and religious festivals, has prompted governments around the world to launch educational programmes to discourage trigger-happy partygoers.

A TV and radio campaign in Macedonia in 2005 used the slogan: "Bullets are not greeting cards – celebrate without weapons."

[snowychap]

Libya's rebel forces committed abuses, says Amnesty

Amnesty International has called on Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC) to take steps to prevent human rights abuses by anti-Gaddafi forces.

In its latest report, the group says that while the bulk of violations were carried out by loyalist forces, anti-Gaddafi fighters have also been involved in torture and killings.

Earlier, Col Muammar Gaddafi vowed in a TV message to fight "until victory".

The whereabouts of the 69-year-old fugitive leader remain unknown.

In another development, NTC leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil has delivered his first public speech in Tripoli since the ousting of Col Gaddafi, urging a modern democratic state based on "moderate" Islam.

Anti-Gaddafi forces have halted their assault on the town of Bani Walid which remains in loyalist hands. Correspondents say they have been met with more resistance than they had expected.

'Revenge killings'

In its report, Amnesty International concludes that the majority of abuses during the conflict have been committed by forces loyal to Col Gaddafi.

They include deliberate attacks on civilians, a widescale campaign of enforced disappearances, and arbitrary detention and torture - atrocities which could amount to war crimes, it says.

But, it says, those fighting Col Gaddafi have also been complicit in serious violations.

The report refers to the lynching of black Africans suspected of being mercenaries hired by Col Gaddafi, as well as revenge killings and the torture of some captured pro-Gaddafi soldiers.

Amnesty said a full picture had yet to emerge, but said it had asked Libya's opposition leadership to take steps to rein in its supporters and investigate any abuses, and to combat xenophobia and racism.

...more on link

Edit: And NATO are, apparently, still bombing Bani Walid. How's that fit with the UN resolution?

[peterms]

Edit: And NATO are, apparently, still bombing Bani Walid. How's that fit with the UN resolution?

I think the practice parted company with the theory some time ago. I can't see how the resolution would cover it.

Turkey appears to have played it better than us, if self-interest as measured in influence over other states is the criterion (it usually is, unless raw profit shoulders it aside).