Watching Libya March 31, 2011

The first sign that Gheddafi's 60 year old foreign minister Moussa Koussa had defected came on Tuesday (March 29) morning from Tunis-Afrique Presse (TAP), when the Tunisian news service revealed that according to "security sources" at the Ras Jedir border crossing, the Secretary of the General People's Committee of Foreign Relations and International Cooperation (Moussa Koussa's official title) had entered Tunisia the previous afternoon (Monday, March 28). TAP's report went on to quote "well informed sources" at the Tunisian foreign ministry according to which the Libyan minister was not in Tunisia on official business but had entered the country on a "private visit". TAP further pointed out that Moussa Koussa is not on the list of Libyan officials who are banned from travelling by UN resolution. [ http://www.tap.info.tn/en/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=16480&Itemid=27 ]

Moussa Koussa flew on from the Tunisian airport of Djerba  to Farnborough in Hampshire (UK) on a private charter plane (BBC). It appears that Moussa Koussa - whose family is with him in the UK - "has been communicating with the British government throughout the recent military action" [ http://blogs.ft.com/westminster/2011/03/more-on-moussa-koussa-the-libyan-defector/ ].

That Moussa Koussa abandoned Gheddafi's (not yet sinking) ship is important for four reasons, over and above his obvious immediate value to intelligence.

One, it indicates that the situation in the regime's inner circles has seriously deteriorated. There are conflicting estimates of where he stood in the regime's hyerarchy. According to some Moussa Koussa did not belong to Gheddafi's innermost circle but he was certainly one of the regime's top executives. Mustafa Gheriani, a spokesman for Transitional National Council (TNC), is one of those that place him closer to Gheddafi than the dictator's own family members. He says: "He is a very, very major person to defect. Gaddafi trusted him more than some of his sons."

The very fact that he was able to get out of the country through that section of Libya's border closest to Tripoli and where the regime is - especially after the brutal suppression of the revolt in Zawiya - apparently in full control, indicates that Gheddafi's security apparatus is not as monolithic as some may imagine it to be. For Moussa Koussa to have been able to drive the three odd hours from Tripoli to the Tunisian border and to have crossed unchallenged by Libyan security at the Ras Jedir frontier post, suggests either very efficient organisation from his side (which would further suggest that he, former intelligence chief, could rely on a powerful network within Libya's security apparatus loyal to him personally) or a system so inefficient that it allows a high profile individual acting on his own to simply leave the country without arousing any suspicion. If we can dismiss the hypothesis that the regime itself consented to or even encouraged his departure and the trip to London, the first conclusion to be drawn is that in any case the regime is beginning to fall apart.

Two, if Moussa Koussa fled unchallenged because he was considered to be above suspicion, then Gheddafi now knows that he can trust nobody around him. This will increase what must be an already extremely high level of tension within the inner circle to an unbearable level, encouraging further high level defections. His departure will encourage other high ranking officials to leave, if for no other reason that Gheddafi will now pick on them at the slightest hint of their less than absolute loyalty.

Three, at some stage, the International Criminal Court (ICC) will certainly want to question him. Luis Moreno-Ocampo, the ICC's prosecutor, is expected to investigate Gheddafi and his immediate family, the heads of internal and external security and military intelligence, and the foreign minister, namely Moussa Koussa. Moreover, Scottish prosecutors have already notified the UK Foreign Office that they want to interview him in connection with the Lockerbie bombing. In the 1980s he was a leading member of the Libyan Bureau for External Security (the Mathaba) which has been linked to the Lockerbie bombing. The TNC in Benghazi has also let it be known that it wants Moussa Koussa returned and tried for crimes against humanity once Gheddafi is ousted. Knowing that one of their most senior - and, some claim, most feared - colleagues may soon have to account for his role in the regime's misdoings at home and abroad, will further demoralise the regime's 'top and middle management' with, possibly, the exception of Gheddafi and his immediate family.

Four, Moussa Koussa's defection will lift the rebels' morale at a moment when they certainly need it. Gheddafi's forces have continued their advance eastwards toward Brega. Ras Lanouf and Es Sider,  to the west of Brega, have both fallen to loyalist troops. Zueitina, east of Brega, is still in opposition hands. Some of the rebels have retreated as far east as Ajdabiya, only about 150 km from Benghazi. As we upload this note, Ajdabiya is at risk. Meanwhile Gheddafi continues to shell Misratah.

When the Ras Lanouf oil installations were hit on March 10, analysts at Barclays Capital said: “Today has brought the first very visible manifestation in Libya of what is always fairly likely to happen when a conflict breaks out in an area rich with oil industry infrastructure. The large explosions and enormous columns of smoke from storage tanks and other facilities in Ras Lanuf, close to the Es Sider terminal, [...] represent a final fading of any residual realistic hope that the outage of Libyan oil could prove to be anything other than prolonged.” Considering the possibility of a long-term survival of the Gheddafi regime and, therefore, of long-term sanctions against the Libyan National Oil Company (NOC), they contemplated a scenario characterised by the long-term loss of Libyan oil supplies and, consequently, of sustained high oil prices dragging on the world economy. [ http://blogs.wsj.com/source/2011/03/10/libyas-threat-to-world-economy-grows/ ]

If this defection will, as expected, accelerate the fall of the Gheddafi regime, then the economic consequences of Mr. Moussa Koussa - permit us to borrow part of the title of one of Keynes' celebrated essays -  will be far reaching.