Libya
Gadhafi may pull Libya out of Arab League

afrol News, 3 March - The diplomatic feud between Libya and Saudi Arabia is growing after Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz traded insults in public Saturday at the Arab League summit in Egypt. Mr Gadhafi now threatens to pull Libya out of Arab League.

Egypt's Middle East News Agency (MENA) reports that Mr Gadhafi announced he was likely to pull Libya out of the Arab League at a meeting Monday with Egyptian newspaper editors in Cairo. The Libyan leader holds the 22-nation body is too ineffective. 

Mr Gadhafi and Crown Prince Abdullah participated in an extraordinary Arab League summit, being broadcast live, to discuss the planned US attack on Iraq when the Libyan leader criticised the Saudi Arabian and Kuwaiti for "cooperating with the Devil" by hosting US troops on their soil.

- King Fahd told me that his country was threatened and that he would cooperate with the Devil to protect it, Mr Gadhafi said on live broadcast. The Saudi Arabian Crown Prince, infuriated by the insult, said his country was "a Muslim country and not an agent of imperialism like you and others are," before questioning how Mr Gadhafi had come to power in Libya in the first place. 

Egyptian television cut the live feed as insults were continuing and switched to black monitors. Shortly thereafter, the Saudi Crown Prince left the summit, only to be persuaded back in again by the joint efforts of the Presidents of Egypt, Syria and Lebanon. In Tripoli, furious crowds immediately took to the streets in an attempt to attack the Saudi embassy.

Meanwhile, Libya has recalled its ambassador to Saudi Arabia "for consultations" as the trading of insults has continued after the Egyptian Arab League summit. 

Libya's official news agency, JANA, reports that the secretariat of the General People's Congress has expressed "strong discontent for the verbal attack launched against the positions of the great revolution and its symbol, leader Moammar Gadhafi." 

In Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, the press - which is largely government-controlled - has launched a series of verbal attacks against the Libyan leader, some editorials even calling to overthrow Mr Gadhafi. 

- Dealing with the madness of Gadhafi and others like him must be the first point on the agenda of a programme to reform the Arab situation, otherwise this nation will go from bad to worse, writes the leading Saudi daily 'Okaz' in an editorial today.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal was quoted by 'Al-Jazirah' newspaper on Monday as saying that the "era of comity and flattering is over and every Arab official should be held responsible for practices which may harm Arab world interests." 

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