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Saturday 4 July 2009

A Couple Of Strays

First a couple of follow ups .......

Sirte In Libya
Sirte In Libya

The Gadfather is in top form at the moment, and has continued cutting a swathe across the international scene. In this case, he sent every one in the African Union scurrying to his 'hometown' of Sirte. A town of such flyblown insignificance that even Wikipedia struggles to say anything good about about it.

Just to give you an idea of how poor is the Libyan infrastructure these days, according to the report there is such a shortage of hotel accommodation, that journalists and diplomats are sleeping on an ageing Greek-owned cruise liner moored in the harbour. Even in the AU press room, there is no phone signal and the journalists and dignitaries have almost come to blows as they grapple for Internet lines, also in chronically short supply.

What can you say about this continent?

Back in Europe, I have been much taken by Portugal's 'drug liberalisation' experiment, since experiencing it at first hand. This BBC report has followed up the consequences and possible lessons to be learnt from this social shift.

I suspect that this story will continue to be of great interest to governments around the world, desperate to find a solution to the most pernicious social problem facing the world.

Update: If Sirte was sh*thole when Gadaffi was in power .... its even worse now after it was fought over by all the warring parties in the post Gadaffi civil war. Occupied by ISIS it was effectively flattened in the fighting. 

Sirte In Libya Post Gadaffi
Sirte In Libya Post Gadaffi

In February 2015 an ISIS video showed its fighters decapitating 21 men, almost all of them Egyptian Coptic Christians who were kidnapped in Sirte .... they then ran out of Christians and started killing other Muslims. Once home to 80,000, it was emptied when up to two thirds of the population fled.

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