OPINION
January 1, 2012 | Doyle McManus
It was a bad year for the villains of the world. Three of the biggest bad guys met their ends: Osama bin Laden, killed by U.S. commandos who stormed his villa in Pakistan in May; Moammar Kadafi, killed by Libyan insurgents who captured him (with the help of a NATO airstrike) in October; and Kim Jong Il, the ruler of North Korea, who died Dec. 17, reportedly of a heart attack. Bin Laden was the most important. Americans remember him, of course, as the architect of the terrorist attacks of Sept.
WORLD
December 17, 2011 | By David S. Cloud, Los Angeles Times
Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta, on his first visit to Libya since the fall of Moammar Kadafi, warned that its government faces "a long and difficult transition" as it seeks to bring militias and tribes under its control. The new government in Tripoli has struggled to disarm the disparate forces that ousted Kadafi with NATO backing two months ago, raising fears of further factional fighting. It is a tall order for a country whose institutions withered under Kadafi and whose government buildings were widely damaged in the eight-month uprising, including by NATO bombing.
WORLD
December 8, 2011 | By Ruth Sherlock, Los Angeles Times
Weary of continuing gunfire in the streets of the capital, Libya's interim government has given notice to out-of-town militias to hand in their weapons and leave Tripoli in order to help steer the country toward civilian rule. Militias have until Dec. 20 to leave, said Abdul-Rafik Bu Hajjar, head of the Tripoli municipal council, threatening to ban all traffic except vehicles from the Interior and Defense ministries if the militias fail to comply. His order has the backing of the new prime minister, Abdel-Rahim Keeb.
WORLD
December 7, 2011 | By Tracy Wilkinson, Los Angeles Times
Mexican authorities announced Wednesday that they had busted an international smuggling ring that was planning to sneak a son of Moammar Kadafi into Mexico, where he was to be ensconced in a ritzy oceanfront estate. Saadi Kadafi, the 38-year-old son of the deposed and slain dictator, and three relatives were to travel to Mexico using falsified documents that gave them new names and Mexican citizenship, authorities said. The plot involved a network of safe houses, illicit bank accounts and private jets crisscrossing the globe from the Middle East to Kosovo to Canada, said Alejandro Poire, Mexico's interior minister.
WORLD
November 22, 2011 | By Ruth Sherlock, Los Angeles Times
Libya's interim prime minister on Tuesday unveiled a new Cabinet apparently assembled with an eye to subduing regional factions, which have grown increasingly adversarial in the scramble for power since the overthrow of longtime strongman Moammar Kadafi. The new political leadership, which will run Libya until elections are held next year, faces the daunting task of creating a workable government and uniting a country ravaged by war and 42 years of dictatorial rule. "All of Libya is represented," Prime Minister Abdel-Rahim Keeb told a news conference in the capital, Tripoli.
WORLD
November 19, 2011 | By Patrick J. McDonnell, Los Angeles Times
He was the reformist face of the Moammar Kadafi regime, a cosmopolitan intellectual who fraternized with London high society, rehabilitated Libyan dissidents and pledged to bring democracy to his father's long-repressed domain. But he was also an ambitious heir apparent and fierce defender of his father's rule, vowing that "rivers of blood" would flow when "Arab Spring"-inspired protesters took to Libya's streets early this year. Now Seif Islam Kadafi finds himself in the hands of those protesters-turned-rulers, and they will probably show no mercy for this contradictory figure who both embraced and rejected his father's dictatorial ways.