直升機現(xiàn)身 投下瓶裝水

    據(jù)報道，這艘難民船3月25日從利比亞首都的黎波里出發(fā)，船上47人來自埃塞俄比亞，其余分別來自尼日利亞、加納和蘇丹等國；當中有20名婦女和兩個兒童，其中一人只有1歲。船長來自加納。

    船只目的地是距的黎波里180英里的意大利蘭佩杜薩島，然而小船起航18小時后，便在距的黎波里約60英里處出現(xiàn)問題。船上有人用衛(wèi)星電話通知身處羅馬的神父齊拉，他是一個難民權益組織的負責人。齊拉立即通知意大利海岸警衛(wèi)隊，要求營救。過了不久，一架寫有“army”的直升機在小船上空盤旋，機師投下瓶裝水和餅干，并讓難民保持在原位，直至救援船到達。然而，直升機飛走后，救援船卻一直沒有出現(xiàn)。

    舉孩子求救 航母拒施援

    等待數(shù)小時后，難民認定不會有人前來救援。當時只剩20公升燃油，船長稱目的地距離不遠，不用救援也可到達。但到3月27日時，船只迷失方向，燃料用盡，衛(wèi)星電話電池同樣用盡。4月2日后，小船漂流至一艘北約航母旁邊，絕望的難民以為可以得救。

    航母上飛出兩架戰(zhàn)機，在小船上空低飛；難民高舉兩個孩子示意，卻得不到救援。小船燃油耗盡無法靠近航母，繼續(xù)隨波漂流，眼睜睜看著航母愈駛愈遠。

    這一事件被英國《衛(wèi)報》揭發(fā)后，意大利海岸警衛(wèi)隊稱曾通知馬耳他前往搜救，馬耳他否認與事件有關；沒有一個國家承認派出這架直升機。至于拒絕施救的航母，英國《衛(wèi)報》翻查資料后確定是法國“戴高樂”號。法國海軍官員最初表示航母當時不在該水域，當記者出示有關證據(jù)時，官員立即拒絕置評。

    飲尿吃牙膏 尸體拋下海

    24歲的庫爾克來自埃塞俄比亞，因逃避家鄉(xiāng)種族沖突而登上小船。他靠飲自己的尿液解渴，又吃了兩支牙膏充饑；每天起來便發(fā)現(xiàn)又有人餓死，船上尸體愈來愈多，余下的人不得不將尸體拋下海。他說：“我們都不知自己是誰。我們不是在祈禱，便是走向死亡。”

    船上人雖然留下一小瓶水（來自直升機）給兩個孩子，他們的雙親早已撒手人寰，但幾天后，兩個孩子也相繼死去。4月中旬左右，小船被沖到利比亞米蘇拉塔附近城鎮(zhèn)茲利坦，當時船上只剩下11人生還。

附文4：IMF和世界銀行主導利比亞重建

附英文原文：

by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky

來源：Globalresearch.ca

"There is no tomorrow" under a NATO sponsored Al Qaeda rebellion. 

While a  "pro-democracy" rebel government has been instated, the country has been destroyed.

Against the backdrop of war propaganda, Libya's economic and social achievements over the last thirty years, have been brutally reversed: 

The [Libyan Arab Jamahiriya] has had a high standard of living and a robust per capita daily caloric intake of 3144. The country has made strides in public health and, since 1980, child mortality rates have dropped from 70 per thousand live births to 19 in 2009. Life expectancy has risen from 61 to 74 years of age during the same span of years. (FAO, Rome, Libya, Country Profile,)

According to sectors of the "Progressive Left" which have endorsed NATO's R2P mandate:  "The mood across Libya, particularly in Tripoli, is absolutely —like there’s just a feeling of euphoria everywhere. People are incredibly excited about starting afresh. There’s a real sense of rebirth, a feeling that their lives are starting anew. (DemocracyNow.org, September 14, 2011 emphasis added)

The rebels are casually presented as "liberators". The central role of Al Qaeda affilated terrorists within rebel ranks is not mentioned.

"Starting afresh" in the wake of destruction? Fear and Social Despair, Countless Deaths and Atrocities, amply documented by the independent media.  

No euphoria.... A historical reversal in the country's economic and social development has occurred. The achievements have been erased.

The NATO invasion and occupation marks the ruinous "rebirth" of Libya's standard of living  That is the forbidden and unspoken truth:  an entire Nation has been destabilized and destroyed, its people driven into abysmal poverty.  

The objective of the NATO bombings from the outset was to destroy the country's standard of living, its health infrastructure, its schools and hospitals, its water distribution system.

And then "rebuild" with the help of donors and creditors under the helm of the IMF and the World Bank.

The diktats of the "free market" are a precondition for the instatement of  a Western style "democratic dictatorship ". 

About nine thousand strike sorties, tens of thousands of strikes on civilian targets including residential areas, government buildings, water supply and electricity generation facilities. (See NATO Communique, September 5, 2011. 8140 strike sorties from March 31 to September 5, 2011)

An entire nation has been bombed with the most advanced ordnance, including uranium coated ammunition.

Already in August, UNICEF warned that extensive NATO bombing of Libya's water infrastructure "could turn into an unprecedented health epidemic “ (Christian Balslev-Olesen of UNICEF's Libya Office, August 2011).

Meanwhile investors and donors have positioned themselves. "War is Good for Business'. NATO, the Pentagon and the Washington based international financial institutions (IFIs) operate in close coordination. What has been destroyed by NATO will be rebuilt, financed by Libya's external creditors under the helm of the "Washington Consensus":

"Specifically, the [World] Bank has been asked to examine the need for repair and restoration of services in the water, energy and transport sectors [bombed by NATO] and, in cooperation with the International Monetary Fund, to support budget preparation [austerity measures] and help the banking sector back on to its feet [The Libyan Central bank was one of the first government buildings to be bombed]. Employment generation for young Libyans has been added as an urgent need facing the country." (World Bank to Help Libya Rebuild and Deliver Essential Services to Citizens emphasis added)

Libya's Development Achievements

Whatever one's views regarding Moamar Gadaffi, the post-colonial Libyan government played a key role in eliminating poverty and developing the country's health and educational infrastructure. According to Italian Journalist Yvonne de Vito, "Differently from other countries that went through a revolution – Libya is considered to be the Switzerland of the African continent and is very rich and schools are free for the people. Hospitals are free for the people. And the conditions for women are much better than in other Arab countries." (Russia Today, August 25, 2011)

These developments are in sharp contrast to what most Third World countries were able to "achieve" under Western style "democracy" and "governance" in the context of a standard IMF-World Bank Structural Adjustment program (SAP).

Public Health Care

Public Health Care in Libya prior to NATO's "Humanitarian Intervention" was the best in Africa. "Health care is [was] available to all citizens free of charge by the public sector. The country boasts the highest literacy and educational enrolment rates in North Africa. The Government is [was] substantially increasing the development budget for health services.... (WHO Libya Country Brief )

Confirmed by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), undernourishment was less than 5 %, with a daily per capita calorie intake of 3144 calories. (FAO caloric intake figures indicate availability rather than consumption).

The Libyan Arab Jamahiriya provided to its citizens what is denied to many Americans: Free public health care, free education, as confirmed by WHO and UNESCO data.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO): Life expectancy at birth was 72.3 years (2009), among the highest in the developing World.

Under 5 mortality rate per 1000 live births declined from 71 in 1991 to 14 in 2009 
(http://www.who.int/countryfocus/cooperation_strategy/ccsbrief_lby_en.pdf) 
 

Libyan Arab Jamahiriya (2009)

Total life expectancy at birth (years)                  72.3
Male life expectancy at birth (years)                  70.2
Female life expectancy at birth (years)               74.9
Newborns with low birth weight (%)                  4.0
Children underweight (%)                                  4.8
Perinatal mortality rate per 1000 total births      19
Neonatal mortality rate                                     11.0
Infant mortality rate (per 1000 live births)         14.0
Under five mortality rate (per 1000 live births)  20.1
Maternal mortality ratio (per 10000 live births)  23

Source WHO http://www.emro.who.int/emrinfo/index.aspx?Ctry=liy  

Education

The adult literacy rate was of the order of 89%, (2009), (94% for males and 83% for females). 99.9% of youth are literate (UNESCO 2009 figures, See UNESCO, Libya Country Report)

Gross primary school enrolment ratio was 97% for boys and 97% for girls (2009) .
(see UNESCO tables at http://stats.uis.unesco.org/unesco/TableViewer/document.aspx?ReportId=121&IF_Language=eng&BR_Country=4340&BR_Region=40525

The pupil teacher ratio in Libya's primary schools was of the order of 17 (1983 UNESCO data), 74% of school children graduating from primary school were enrolled in secondary school (1983 UNESCO  data).

Based on more recent date, which confirms a marked increase in school enrolment, the Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) in secondary schools was of the order of 108% in 2002. The GER is the number of pupils enrolled in a given level of education regardless of age expressed as a percentage of the population in the theoretical age group for that level of education.

For tertiary enrolment (postsecondary, college and university), the Gross Enrolment Ratio (GER) was of the order of 54% in 2002 (52 for males, 57 for females).
(For further details see http://stats.uis.unesco.org/unesco/TableViewer/document.aspx?ReportId=121&IF_Language=eng&BR_Country=4340&BR_Region=40525

Women's Rights

With regard to Women's Rights, World Bank data point to significant achievements.

"In a relative short period of time, Libya achieved universal access for primary education, with 98% gross enrollment for secondary, and 46% for tertiary education. In the past decade, girls’ enrollment increased by 12% in all levels of education. In secondary and tertiary education, girls outnumbered boys by 10%." (World Bank Libya Country Brief, emphasis added)

Price Controls over Essential Food Staples

In most developing countries, essential food prices have skyrocketed, as a result of market deregulation, the lifting of price controls and the eliminaiton of subsidies, under "free market" advice from the World Bank and the IMF.

In recent years, essential food and fuel prices have spiralled as a result of speculative trade on the major commodity exchanges.

Libya was one of the few countries in the developing World which maintained a system of price controls over essential food staples.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick acknowledged in an April 2011 statement that the price of essential food staples had increased by 36 percent in the course of the last year. See Robert Zoellick, World Bank 

The Libyan Arab Jamahiriya had established a system of price controls over essential food staples, which was maintained until the onset of the NATO led war.

While rising food prices in neighbouring Tunisia and Egypt spearheaded social unrest and political dissent, the system of food subsidies in Libya was maintained. 

These are the facts confirmed by several UN specialised agencies.

"Missile Diplomacy" and "The Free Market"

War and Globalization are intiricately related.  The IMF and NATO work in tandem, in liason with the Washington think tanks.

The NATO operation purports to enforce the neoliberal economic agenda. Countries which are reluctant to accept the sugar coated bullets of IMF "economic medicine" will eventually be the object of a R2P NATO humanitarian operation.

Déjà Vu? Under the British Empire, "gun boat diplomacy" was a means to imposing "free trade". On October 5, 1850, England's Envoy to the Kingdom of Siam, Sir James Brooke recommended to Her Majesty's government that:

"should these just demands [to impose free trade] be refused, a force should be present, immediately to enforce them by the rapid destruction of the defenses of the [Chaopaya] river... Siam may be taught the lesson which it has long been tempting-- its Government may be remodelled, A better disposed king placed on the throne and an influence acquired in the country which will make it of immense commercial importance to England" (The Mission of Sir James Brooke, quoted in M.L. Manich Jumsai, King Mongkut and Sir John Bowring, Chalermit, Bangkok, 1970, p. 23)

Today we call it "Regime Change" and "Missile Diplomacy" which invariably takes the shape of a UN sponsored "No Fly Zone". Its objective is to impose the IMF's deadly "economic medicine" of austerity measures and privatization.  

The World Bank financed "reconstruction" programs of war torn countries are coordinated with US-NATO military planning. They are invariably formulated prior to onslaught of the military campaign...

Confiscating Libyan Financial Assets

Libya`s frozen overseas financial assets are estimated to be of the order of $150 billion, with NATO countries holding more than $100 billion. 

Prior to the war, Libya had no debts. In fact quite the opposite. It was a creditor nation investing in neighboring African countries.

The R2P military intervention is intended to spearhead the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya into the straightjacket of an indebted developing country, under the surveillance of the Washington based Bretton Woods institutions.  

In a bitter irony, after having stolen Libya's oil wealth and confiscated its overseas financial assets, the "donor community" has pledged to lend the (stolen) money back to finance Libya's post-war "reconstruction".   Libya is slated to join the ranks of indebted African countries which have driven into poverty by IMF and the World Bank since the onsalught of the debt crisis in the early 1980s:

The IMF promised a further $35-billion in funding [loans] to countries affected by Arab Spring uprisings and formally recognized Libya’s ruling interim council as a legitimate power, opening up access to a myriad of international lenders as the country [Libya] looks to rebuild after a six-month war.  ...

Getting IMF recognition is significant for Libya’s interim leaders as it means international development banks and donors such as the World Bank can now offer financing.

The Marseille talks came a few days after world leaders agreed in Paris to free up billions of dollars in frozen assets [stolen money] to help [through loans] Libya’s interim rulers restore vital services and rebuild after a conflict that ended a 42-year dictatorship.

The financing deal by the Group of Seven major economies plus Russia is aimed at supporting reform efforts [IMF sponsored structural adjustment] in the wake of uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East.

The financing is mostly in the form of loans, rather than outright grants, and is provided half by G8 and Arab countries and half by various lenders and development banks. (Financial Post, September 10, 2011,

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