This past two weeks, North Africa has been in an uproar. In Egypt, two million citizens demand that their democratically elected government step down. In Libya, Parliament passes a law prohibiting officials who served under Qaddafi from holding senior offices. If the law passes legal challenges, it will mean that the president, prime minister, much […]
This hardly seems like the moment to ask what type of state will emerge in Libya. Two years on from the uprising that eventually toppled Muammar Qaddafi, the country hardly has a functioning state at all. There is still no constitution and there may not be one for months. The parliament, elected less than a […]
A CLUTCH of archaeologists sits in a freshly upholstered auditorium near the Roman amphitheatre in Leptis Magna to learn how to use a global positioning system, something restricted to the security forces under Colonel Muammar Qaddafi. “Take a picture, then note the co-ordinates,” says an instructor, showing slides of the ruins (pictured above). The country […]
There is relentless speculation in the French news media about whether former president Nicolas Sarkozy could announce a political comeback. In a TV interview, Valérie Pécresse, who was Sarkozy’s spokeswoman and budget minister until François Hollande won election in May, was asked if her boss was “dead and buried”; and Pécresse responded, “There is a […]
looking beyond borders 