This blog post was published on April 12 2011. §
The Libyan “revolution”: come to the dark side we have ice cream
Allow me to introduce you to Libya’s Al-Naseem Ice-cream and Dairy Factory:
With more than 95% of the staff are Libyan nationality, and the presence of chemical and safety laboratories, the Libyans like to call Al-Naseem the proud of the Libyan industry. This is an English language introduction video to Al-Naseem Factory owned by Raiedha family clan.
Like such many factories in the Third World, the quality is always an issue, here is man photographed his ice cream complains that it misses the biscuit cone (image). Another Libyan transferred to the hospital with food-poisoning after eating contaminated yoghourt produced by Al-Naseem Factory.
Despite the above Al-Naseem Dairy and Ice cream Company won the B.I.D. International Quality Award in New York 2010 competing against 65 different countries.
But there is a dark side of the Ice cream:
In an article called “The secrets of the Libyan war”, Al-Kifah Al-Arabi magazine reveals Al-Naseem Factory’s role before the start of the “revolution” in Libya:
The spark that ignited the current Libyan clashes as a pretext for foreign intervention began on the port of Misrata city …
Weeks before the start of the Libyan revolution, the port of Misrata used by the rebels to smuggle containers full of weapons, ammunition and explosives with cooperation of the rebels sympathizers port’s managers …
… The arms containers emptied at Misrata’s port without going through any customs inspection and kept in the Al-Naseem’s underground stores, later the arms transported to Benghazi,Tripoli and other cities in Dairy trucks to be distributed among the rebels at the first days of the revolution”.
The question asked by the magazine is: Where did these arms come from?
Post-embargo era Libya was interested in distributing its investment in a balanced manner between development and arms, oil contracts with China, arms contracts with Russia, and billion dollars contracts with Germany from wind-farms, to about 12 German oil companies active in Libya (here is an excellent book “The Libyan economy: economic diversification and international repositioning” explain the success of the Libyan economic process).
Also a good article about “Germany interests in Libya” on WSWS.org and why European countries affected by these contracts moved to encourage the rebels living abroad Islamists inside Libya to start their “revolution”.
The interview with Ali Al-Tarhouni the head of the financial and economic affairs in the Libyan National Transitional Council telling German newspaper Zeit, gives us a clear indication on who is behind the arms containers:
I think that countries such as France who helped us in the very early stage [of the revolution] will reap the benefits of this position … Our most beautiful beaches in the world are very close to Europe … We want to establish a financial center in collaboration with international investors…
Al-Kifah Al-Arabi also reported the following:
….. Among the articles shipped to the rebels there at least 1000 “Thuraya” cell phones distributed among the rebels days before the start of the crisis in Libya.
“Thuraya” cell telephones are distributed among the rebels to receive or connect to any place in the world without the need for local networks and the Libyan government was suspicious about the sudden increase in Thuraya’s network traffic, that is why the Libyans started to jam Thuraiya’s communication as reported on Al-Khaleej Times days before the “revolution”.
The popularity of Thuraya phones among the rebels is mentioned here in this Nytimes story:
.… Took him up to the hotel’s internet café and tried to help him arrange a Skype chat which didn’t go through. Someone eventually brought the pilot a Thuraya satellite phone which he used to call his family.
Just like the Iraq’s scenario the British-French attack on Libya came in a period of which Libya witnesses a boom in construction and building the infrastructure that attract international companies seeking to sign contracts with Libya, but the British and the French shares in these contracts were not significant