Breaking: Libyan Gov Declares Ceasefire after UN Declares No-Fly Zone

Al Jazeera breaks it, and my spidey senses...do somethin.

The statement from the government claims an immediate stop to all military operations, and an immediate ceasefire. And it also says that "Libya takes great interest in protecting civilians".

I'm gonna try to walk that line between crying and laughing hysterically at that one.

This is happening because yesterday, the UN stopped shuffling their feet and enacted a No-Fly Zone over Libya in response to the month of the Gaddafi regime shooting, burning, bombing and otherwise brutalizing their population. The sheer thought of the international community actually putting their proverbial shoulders to a cause (especially when that cause includes more jets than they have) might have been enough to make the regime approach sensibility. Or just try and find ways to quell protests in ways that put them on international television less.
As with most Libyan news, any good news is suspect. We'll see whether this "ceasefire" actually results in anyone from the military side actually not firing (case in point: reports from Misurata say the Gaddafi regime is still shelling them. You say ceasefire, I say bomb a suburb...).
In the meantime, cautious optimism for the win?

State of the Revolution II: Revolution Harder

Good morning, my little sunspots! It's Friday! That makes it Pray-Then-Protest day in the Middle East--and I've got a couple hours in Toronto to burn, so let's catch up, shall we?

Yemen: after a few weeks of fairly regular protests, current president Ali Abdullah Saleh offered a unity government with the Joint Meeting Parties and the rest of the opposition (who? These guys). To which they said "HA." and promptly kept protesting. Today, the opposition groups counter-offered with an exit strategy. To which the protesters said "HA." and promptly demanded he leave now. Understandable, considering the reports of military firing on protesters in the North. Despots of the Middle East, please stop killing people and just talk already.

One cannot simply rock out of Mordor.

Libya: In Libyan diplomatic (wow, oxymoron) news, a mediator between Gaddafi and the rest of the universe has come to the table in the form of everyone's favourite guitarron-playing Venezuelan egoist, Hugo Chavez! It's completely unclear what sort of mediation could possibly make anything the crazypants dictator is doing even remotely okay, but Gaddafi's apparently cool with it. The rest of the world is mostly ignoring the proposal, looking instead at all the bombing and terrible atrocities happening all over the country. Huh. Go figure. Meanwhile, people in Libya are getting scared to protest--surprise--and there are rumours that the Crazypants Militia is preventing people from leaving via Tunisia. They're also killing their own. Graphic, brutal, and really, really making me want to radicalize, march over there, and do something foolish to that asshole in the mumu.

Tunisia: is busily announcing a new government. This is cool, but significantly less cool once you remember that they've had three interim governments since the revolution. Apparently it's still quite unstable. Understandable.

Bahrain: 's Shiite groups say they're ready to negotiate, so that's what's going down.

Take two! Rolling...

Egypt: Remember them? They recently ousted the prime minister that Mubarak appointed, slowly whittling down the old regime piece by piece. Next target: dissolving the entire National Democratic Party and the State Security Agency.

Wisconsin: Okay, not technically in the Middle East. Mid-West, maybe. Still--did you know they've been protesting in the state building in support of their unions' bargaining rights for like, over a week?? It's been intense! Bring it home, Dairyland!

Libyupdate: Yup, Still Insane.

The last few weeks have confirmed a couple things about Libya.

look at that sign. That's an awesome sign.

1) It's become a bad, bad place to be. Rarely was Tripoli a cushy vacation destination before, but this is just ridiculous:

-the air bombing continues, this time in Brega, an oil outpost. Just to clarify and reiterate: Gaddafi is using the air force to bomb his own country.

-Reports are coming in that Gaddafi's forces have been tying up and burning soldiers that refuse to fight, and burying them in the streets and barracks where they fall. They've also been shooting from ambulances, and killing wounded protesters in hospitals.

-it's becoming increasingly dangerous for Sub-Saharan Africans working in Libya--they're being targeted for violence because they're assumed to be mercenaries hired by the regime. Whether or not they actually are is up for debate, but pre-revolt, sub-Saharan Africans were the majority of over a million foreign nationals in Libya: they certainly can't all be working for the nutbar in the mumu.

-being reasonable people, thousands of Libyans and expats alike are looking around at their situation and deciding to get the hell out of Libya. As a result, the Tunisian and Egyptian borders are overrun with desperate refugees, threatening to rival Tripoli as a humanitarian hypercrisis. Aid staff is trying, and airlifts are happening, but it's understandably quite difficult and really tense.


2) Gaddafi is effin' certifiable. He's orders of magnitude more disconnected from reality than Hosni Mubarak was. The man isn't even in the solar system anymore; he's like an interstellar machine that pumps out human rights atrocities and really ridiculous outfits. I recently learned he wants to abolish Switzerland. What. And it doesn't appear that he's going anywhere.

Yesterday, the world spent a lot of diplomatic face time asking "WTF do we do about Libya?".
It sort of went down like this:

UN Security Council: So Gaddafi's nuts enough to bomb his own capital and endanger the security of a whole hell of a lot of oil interests.... I dunno, let's sanction him and his goons, freeze his assets? Any arguments? Didn't think so. (gavel!)
UN Human Rights Council: Yeah, sack that crazy man. Suspend him from the council. Wtf is he doing on here anyway? Ugh. I need to go wash my hands.
International Criminal Court: Send him to us. I don't care if he hasn't stepped down yet, you heard me.
President Sarkozy of France: Oui, he needs to GTFO.
Basically Every Other EU Leader: What he said.
Prime Minister David Cameron, UK: Yeah, get out--or we'll send in the army! Or we won't. Maybe.
The Arab League: Waitasecond there...
NATO: Guys, this is pretty intense...should I launch a no-fly zone?
Everyone: (foot shuffling) Ummmm.....
(scene.)


In addition, everyone outside of Libya is scrambling to send frigates, planes and warships to rescue their expats from the crazy so they can drill another day.

To lighten the mood, boingboing posted a fantastic video of the UK's Charlie Brooker sending a verbal lashing to Gaddafi. Extra points to the included fashion montage.

And as a last note on Nelly Furtado: big up on you for donating the million dollars Gaddafi paid you for a 45 minute concert in 2007. In honour of your press-worthy save-face, I'll still do my wondering about why 41 years of brutal absurdist military dictatorship and human rights abuses were okay for a pop star to profiteer off before it was really in the news--but I'll do it quietly.

Libya Protests: Things Get Real

Quick update on Libya, which is moving faster than I can keep up with without cloning myself:

 Yesterday's crazy, rambling speech by Gaddafi's son Saif ("the modern face of Libya" basically played the threat of civil war card, and blamed all these protests on drug dealers and the BBC last night) put some spark in the average Libyan step, so today's protests are the most intense and dangerous yet. Everyone knew that Gaddafi and the Libyan government were probably going to be more mercenary than some other Mid-East regimes, but this is getting ridiculous.


Reports of the madness include:

-Fighter jets bombing the capital Tripoli on Gaddafi's orders.

-Consequently, some Libyan air force staff have defected to Malta with their planes.

-The navy firing from the harbours into suburban neighbourhoods

-Libyan diplomats jumping ship, including their entire UN delegation. EU nations prepping to pull their businessfolks, too.

-Ban Ki Moon of UN fame does the UN Finger-Wag Hokey Pokey.

-Gaddafi fleeing to Venezuela....maybe.

-Tons of misinformation, due to thoroughly disrupted communications (they even cut the land lines)

-Abject massacres. Estimates of over 300 dead. And helicopters dropping off more ammunition for the army still.

If you (understandably) can't wait for me to actually follow this stuff, the indispensable Al Jazeera and the excellent Guardian are both covering bases. Links go to Libyan coverage.

Hope and bated breath, Tripoli and co.... let's make this three.

Middle East: the State of the Revolution Address

In Which Ash Recovers from Dropping the Ball on the Protest Movement, Rounds That Collective Craziness Up and Tries to Achieve Some Sense of Scale of the thing.

So I took a little vacation for a few days and travelled haphazardly around central Ontario, and when I finally came to rest in the fine nation's capital and decided I might need to check my email, I checked the news in the Middle East.

Silly Ash, being MIA during the middle of a burgeoning regional revolution.

Suffice it to say that shit's going down.
Wanna hear about it?
(Note to the Geographically Spooked: If you feel like you've never heard of any of these countries, that's fine--the clickable wonder of wikipedia in each header will help with that. Go do some map-learnin! We live in interesting times!)

Algeria
Protests started early and strong in Algiers, and the 19th's demonstration came up against 30,000 riot cops. They stopped them from marching, but it's unlikely they'll stop protesting. If this is surprising to you, you haven't been paying attention.

Bahrain

Bahrain
Manama's been through a lot in the last few days, largely from police firing into swelling but peaceful crowds. Folks seem to want the monarchy and the attendant government out, and are having a good ol' Tahrir-style love in at Pearl Roundabout to make their point. Shi'ite and Sunni Muslims, usually a little tense around each other in Bahrain, are coming together quite nicely. Apparently nothing builds community like a good old democratic revolution. Oh, and there's a national general strike! Those are fun!

China
Whaaaaat? China?? Apparently so! Under the Great Firewall squeaks the rumours of brewing protests in the now-familiar flavour of Jasmine Revolution. Mmm mmm good. Watch this space, if the news can escape the great google-scramblers of Mao and co.

Djibouti
East Africa has actually been protesting since Jan 28th! Who knew? Tired of Ismail Omar Guelleh for President, demonstrators surrounded a stadium and don't want to go home until they get what they want. Then again, they're being beaten with batons and tear gassed.

Iran

Marraketch in Morocco

Protests in Tehran are being menaced by basiji militia tear gas and batons and a bunch of people detained in Shiraz. However, Iranians are my personal heroes for being the original face of Middle Eastern protest movements, so I've got significant faith that they're not going anywhere. Even though there are 1984-esque stories coming out of the unofficial state media that there are no protests happening anyway. Sure.

Iraq
Oh my god, they want better government services and for someone to handle unemployment--say it ain't so. People in Basra and other large cities took to the streets in the thousands. Also, someone wrote the word "Governor" on a donkey in the middle of a square in Kut. Cheeky.

Jordan
For the last seven weeks, Friday has been "quick!-flood-the-square" day in Jordan, but the demonstrations against the absolute monarchy aren't quite at the same level of cohesion as some of the other places on this illustrious list. They also appear to be getting more violent, slowly. Lame.

Libya
After Four days of crazy, there are loads dead. The Guardian says that "talk of massacres is not exaggerated"--the army keeps firing on protestersin Benghazi. Media's not blacked out, although reports fly that they're trying. You may remember their president from his cablegate-publicized botox and hot nurse: after 42 years in power, Muammar al-Qaddafi's still a big jerk. Protests have spread to Tripoli, and are not slowing down.

Morocco
With the wholesale rejection of "a constitution made for slaves", thousands turn out for peaceful protests in a bunch of Moroccan major cities. Marraketch has apparently degraded into violence, with protesters sacking the police station and government buildings. The state media is covering it, though, which may give credence to the government's insistence that it's much more liberal than the rest of these goons running the Mid East. Protesters still want a new constitution, a change in government, and for the overall smog of corruption to clear though.

Yemen

Yemen
Sanaa's been protesting for 11 days now, and 3,000 students in the streets have pushed President Saleh past his initial concessions ("I swear I won't run after 2013 guys. Unlike the last 30 years, I'm super serious this time.") and into claims he's ready to dialogue. It's actually pretty complicated, though, so AJE breaks it down with the usual insight and grace.




Extra Credit: 
Tunisia

40,000 folks were back on the streets of Tunis again protesting the interim government's persistence, and demanding that the remainders of the regime they overthrew actually leave the seat of power.

Egypt

Once again, AJE makes my week with this feature on the fantabulous women of Tahrir Square. No swimsuit competition, no irrelevant talent component, only the excellence of inspirational and ballsy Arab women, knockin it out the park.