TRIPOLI – Libya and Switzerland have agreed to draw a line under their fierce diplomatic dispute and the Swiss businessman whose detention was at the centre of the row can go home, the Swiss foreign minister said yesterday.
The conflict began two years ago after Swiss police briefly arrested Hannibal Gadafy, a son of Libyan leader Col Muammar Gadafy, and it later escalated to draw in the United States, the European Union and international energy firms.
A breakthrough came last week when Libya freed prisoner Max Goeldi, a Swiss businessman who was barred from leaving Libya soon after Hannibal Gadafy’s arrest and whose release Switzerland has been demanding.
Swiss foreign minister Micheline Calmy-Rey flew to Tripoli in the early hours of yesterday hoping to bring Mr Goeldi home and hours later said she had agreed a deal.
“Max Goeldi will leave the country today,” she told reporters in the Libyan capital. “Goeldi will return to Switzerland and this is the start of the normalisation of relations between the two countries.”
Spanish foreign minister Miguel Angel Moratinos, whose country holds the European Union’s presidency, also flew to Tripoli – a sign of the importance the EU attaches to the flourishing business ties it has with oil exporter Libya.
Mr Goeldi was at the offices of Libya’s immigration authorities waiting for an exit visa and should be on his way home by early Sunday evening, his lawyer Salah Zahaf told Reuters.
The price for Mr Goeldi’s return home appeared to be a Swiss apology for the publication of a leaked police photo of Hannibal Gadafy taken while he was under arrest. Libya says the leak was an invasion of his privacy and damaged his reputation.
The Swiss foreign minister said her country acknowledged the publication was unlawful, apologised, and promised to pay Hannibal Gadafy compensation if a criminal investigation fails to find who was responsible for the leak.
The apology was in a plan of action signed by Ms Calmy-Rey and her Libyan counterpart Moussa Koussa which they said was designed as a blueprint to drawing a line under the row.
“I would like the Libyan people to forgive the Swiss people who committed this mistake against Hannibal Gadafy,” Mr Koussa said. Libyan officials deny there is any link between the Geneva arrest and the case of Max Goeldi.
Mr Goeldi, who works for engineering firm ABB, had until Thursday been serving a four-month prison sentence for immigration violations. Since July 2008 he had been unable to leave Libya and his movements were restricted.
His problems began days after Hannibal Gadafy was arrested at a luxury lakeside hotel in Geneva on charges – which were later dropped – of abusing two domestic employees.
Libya reacted angrily, stopping oil exports to Switzerland and withdrawing assets from Swiss banks. Col Gadafy declared a “jihad” on Switzerland, although his officials said he had meant a trade embargo, not a holy war.
Libya was under international sanctions until 2004 when its leader renounced banned weapons programmes. – (Reuters)