Libya calling

The agreement provides a process for compensating the victims of attacks ranging from the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, to the US air strikes on Tripoli and Benghazi in 1986. It thus removes a final hurdle to Libya establishing normal diplomatic and economic relations with the West and opens the way for US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rices visit to Tripoli this week.

The Joint Statement, while clinically welcoming the agreement, states that both parties thereby turn their focus to the future of their bilateral relationship, underscoring the benefits an expansion of ties would provide for both countries as well as for the American and Libyan peoples. This is a far cry from recent years, when staying at a Libyan-owned hotel would make you subject to a US felony charge!