17 Apr 2011

WEST vs CHINA: A New Cold War begins on Libyan Soil

The question as to why US-led NATO forces are determined to engineer a regime change in Libya is now becoming clear. While media pundits and political experts still argue over whether the Libyan rebel gangs are actually being backed and directed by US, UK and Israel intelligence agencies, broader long-range Western policy objectives for Libya are being completely ignored.

One only has to read the strategic briefings in U.S. AFRICOM documents to realise the true endgame in Libya: the control of valuable resources and the eviction of China from North Africa.

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When the US formed AFRICOM in 2007, some 49 countries signed on to the US military charter for Africa but one country refused: Libya. Such a treacherous act by Libya’s leader Moummar Qaddafi would only sow the seeds for a future conflict down the road in 2011.

According to Bejing’s Ministry of Commerce, China’s current contracts in Libya number no less than 50 large projects involving contracts in excess of 18 billion USD. What is even more revealing here is that due to the recent instability in the North African region, China’s investments have taken a serious hit. The recent political turmoil in the region has caused China’s foreign contracted projects to drop with new contracts amounting to $ 3,470,000,000, down 53.2%. Among them, the amount of new contracts in Libya, down by 45.3%, 13.9% less turnover; to Algeria, the amount of the contract fell 97.1%, turnover decreased by 10.7% – all within the first 2 months of this year.

Much more on 21st Century Wire