Operation Oil Theft: Month 8, Week 2, Day 1.

On Sunday (23/10/11) the Transitional National Council (TNC) declared Libya to be liberated and pledged to institute democracy within eight months. What they actually mean is that they will follow the process laid out in the 11 page Constitutional Declaration document. This requires them to elect, by public vote, an all male National Public Conference (NPC) within 240 days. The NPC will then write a new constitution that will be put to a national referendum. Assuming the constitution adopted by the referendum requires democratic elections to be held they will take place 180 days after the adoption of the constitution. In the meantime the TNC have immediately abolished all national laws that contradict Sharia Law. This means that Libya is currently being run under Sharia Law with a particular focus on allowing men to take multiple wives. As I've yet to hear a single female voice represented in the TNC this does not bode well for the future of women's rights in the new Libya.

Last Friday (21/10/11) NATO provisionally decided to end operations in Libya on Monday (31/10/11). On Thursday (27/10/11) the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) unanimously voted to pass resolution 2016 which removed NATO's mandate to operate in Libya. This forced NATO's hand and they will now definitely end operations in Libya at 23:59 GMT on Monday October 31st. However there are factions within the TNC who want to invite NATO to stay on. This seems like a sensible idea because with all the weapons and the war damage the task the TNC faces now is probably more difficult then when the were fighting Qaddafi.

Throughout the week more and more details have emerged detailing the circumstances of Muammer Qaddafi's death. Although there is no video of the actual killing there is video showing the intial capture, video showing Qaddafi being transfered from the captors to another group of rebels, a video showing Qaddafi being sexually assaulted/raped prior to death and a video showing the moments just after death. In the transfer and aftermath videos men can be seen wearing military uniforms used by the armies of Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) nations such as Qatar and Bahrain but not displaying any identifying insignia. The men are also apparently speaking Arabic with a Gulf region accent that is very different from Libyan Arabic. This coupled with the manner of Qaddafi's death has led to international calls for an investigation. The current theory is that either Libyan rebels trained and taking orders from British special forces were told to kill Qaddafi to make sure that he didn't stand trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC) or that special forces from a GCC country - most likely Qatar - who are themselves trained by Britain were sent to do the job themselves. In response the TNC have announced that they will put Qaddafi's killers on trial. What they mean is that they intend to convict a man who posted a video of himself admitting the killing on the Internet in the hope that he will become a local hero and the whole matter will be forgotten about.

On Tuesday (25/10/11) the TNC finally buried Muammer Qaddafi at a secret location in the desert after his body had been left on public display in Misrata for five days. Although gruesome and totally against Islamic tradition this was sadly necessary to allow as many people as possible to see that Qaddafi is dead and take pictures and video of the corpse. You have to remember that in attacking Libya Britain did not merely want to replace a government that wouldn't sell it oil with one that would. Instead they wanted to create a war torn and full blown failed state into which the oil companies backed by their private armies of security contractors would go and pump the oil out more or less for free. To this end numerous conspiracy theories have started to circulate claiming that Qaddafi isn't really dead and is instead living in places like Zimbabwe, Niger or Algeria. These rumours are backed by very obviously faked pictures of Qaddafi's corpse and "expert" analysis claiming that genuine photographs and videos are actually fake. The idea is to encourage Libyan government forces to continue the fight by mounting an Iraq style insurgency that will tear the country to pieces. Therefore the best way for genuine Libyans to resist the invaders and occupiers now is by laying down their weapons.