ROME — Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi urged the world today to understand what motivates terrorists, and likened the 1986 U.S. strikes on Libya to Osama bin Laden’s terror attacks.
Gadhafi, who was long accused of sponsoring terrorism, struck a provocative tone as he addressed Italian lawmakers on the second day of a trip to Italy, Libya’s former colonial ruler. He said there should be no interference from the West over the governments chosen by other countries.
The speech got tepid applause and was likely to add to the controversy that has surrounded this rare visit by Libya’s strongman to a Western democracy.
“It is not very intelligent to chase terrorists down the Afghan mountains or central Asia,” Gadhafi said in the hour-long speech. “That’s impossible. We must look at their reasons.”
Gadhafi said he condemned terrorism, al-Qaida and bin Laden. But he said he was being intentionally provocative “to try and understand acts of terrorism.”
He said that terrorists, in explaining their motives, might argue they are defending themselves from humiliations suffered at the hands of the West and from the depletion of their riches. He called for dialogue with terrorists, saying, “One must talk to the devil, if it brings about a solution.”
Sarcastically, he asked, “What’s the difference between the U.S. airstrikes on our homes and bin Laden’s actions?” If anything, he said, bin Laden is an outlaw, while the United States is a country that should abide by international law.
Former President Ronald Reagan ordered airstrikes on Tripoli and Benghazi in April 1986 after an attack on a disco in Germany killed three people, including two U.S. servicemen. The Libyans say the retaliatory attacks killed 41 people, including Gadhafi’s adopted daughter, and injured 226 others.
Gadhafi had long been ostracized by the West for sponsoring terrorism, but in recent years sought to emerge from his pariah status by abandoning weapons of mass destruction and renouncing terrorism in 2003.
Libya has since agreed to pay compensation to the families of the Berlin disco victims as well as the families of the victims of the 1988 Pan Am 103 bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, which killed 270 people, including 189 Americans. Libyan Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi was convicted of blowing up the plane.
The United States restored diplomatic ties with Libya in 2006 and removed the North African nation from the State Department list of countries that sponsor terrorism.
Gadhafi’s visit to Italy continued that process of emergence from international isolation.
The visit has highlighted the strong political and economic ties between the two countries, capped by Italy’s $5 billion compensation agreement signed last year to make amends for Rome’s 1911-1941 colonial rule.
But it has also drawn protests.
Gadhafi had been set to speak inside the Italian Senate, a rare honor for visiting dignitaries. But opposition lawmakers balked, saying Gadhafi did not have the democratic credentials necessary to address Parliament, and eventually the speech was moved to a palazzo next door.
Some opposition senators carrying a Lockerbie photo showed up while Gadhafi was speaking, although they remained outside the room.
At La Sapienza university, where the Libyan leader also gave a speech, hundreds of protesting students gathered outside and a few clashed with police.
The students echoed concerns from human rights groups over a recent deal that allows Italy to send immigrants immediately back to Libya if they are intercepted at sea. They also decried Libya’s treatment of the migrants and its poor human rights record.
“It is absurd to invite to a university a head of state who is questioned for his human rights policies,” said Cecilia Signorini, a political science student. “Sure, economic interests are behind it, which should be of no concern to a public university.”
Other critics said the red-carpet welcome granted to Gadhafi went too far.
Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said the government invited Gadhafi, head of the African Union, because Italy wants to put Africa at the center of a Group of Eight summit it hosts next month.
“As African leader, Mr. Gadhafi will be able, I am sure, to contribute to addressing some global issues like mass migration, how to help poorer countries,” Frattini told APTN today. “Respecting Gadhafi is respecting Africa.”
Gadhafi said he would ask the G-8 to reimburse Africa for decades of Western colonization.
Gadhafi’s four-day visit includes a meeting with representatives of Italians expelled from the North African country in 1970, the year after he seized power. It ends Saturday.
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