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Oil behind rehabilitation of Libya, says former UK minister

IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency

London, March 27, IRNA -- Britain`s former Environment Minister 
Michael Meacher suggested Saturday that the rehabilitation on Libya, 
led by Prime Minister Tony Blair, was based on a "cynical strategy" of
the west`s desire for energy security. 
The compliance by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in opening up his 
country to nuclear weapons inspections was "spun as a major triumph 
in the `war on terror`," Meacher said. 
But he added that the motives were "rather more cynical." 
Negotiations with Gaddafi, that began to surface with a visit by UK 
Foreign Office Minister Mike O`Brien in August 2002, were "linked to 
improved western access to Libyan oil," he said. 
Many British politicians and analysts have repeatedly claimed that 
the real motive for last year`s war to overthrow Saddam Hussein`s 
regime in Iraq was not based upon his alleged arms threat but also on 
oil. 
Meacher, who was a staunch opponent of the Iraq war, described the 
Libyan leader as being just the latest beneficiary of the cynical 
strategy with an energy crisis looming in both the UK and the US. 
In an article for the Guardian newspaper Saturday, the former 
minister said that it has been estimated that "by 2020 the UK could 
be dependent on imported energy for 80% of its needs." 
"The US energy department has calculated that net imports of oil, 
already at 54 per cent, will rise to 70 per cent by 2025 because of 
growing demand and declining domestic supply," he said. 
Libya, which holds 3 per cent of world oil reserves, is seen as a 
very low cost producer of high-quality, low-sulphur crude. Even more 
vital for Europe, it also has vast proven natural gas reserves of 46 
trillion cubic feet and even more unexplored. 
Meacher said that the problem of access to Libyan hydrocarbons was 
Gaddafi`s "record of running a state terrorist machine" but added 
that it was "remarkable how sometimes terrorists suddenly turn into 
"statesmanlike and courageous" friends (to use Jack Straw`s phrase)." 
In his article, he also suggested that the west`s extensive 
involvement in the Balkans had related motives to break Russia`s 
monopoly over oil and gas transport routes and secure pro-western 
governments in the strategic Black Sea-Caspian Sea oil-rich basin. 
"The Trans-Balkan pipeline, designed to become the main route to 
the west for oil and gas extracted in central Asia, was to run from 
the Black Sea to the Adriatic via Bulgaria, Macedonia near the border 
with Kosovo, and Albania," the minister said. 
HC/212 
End