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Muammar Qadhafi may have been captured alive in Sirte, but it wasn't long before his dead body was being paraded through the streets of Misrata, a town pulverized by Qadhafi loyalists. The United Nations is predictably demanding an investigation into his alleged summary execution by forces loyal to Libya's new government. The UN's outrage is misplaced, though. We should all be glad Qadhafi is dead. International justice has become a multi-billion dollar industry in which trials last years and justice is seldom served. Serbian dictator Slobodan Milošević died in prison more than four years after his trial began. Liberian dictator...

Remember a peculiar fact: even though Gaddafi was generally a horribly repressive anti-American dictator, in his final years he tried making a deal with the Americans. Gaddafi was frightened by the U.S. attack on Iraq in 2003 and didn’t want to be next on the list. So he cooperated, gave up his nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction programs, and reduced his foreign subversive efforts. That did not save him from being overthrown by the United States, just as it did not save a genuine American ally, President Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. On this point, I’m not advocating anything...

The sitting U.S. President Obama, publicly supported the capture of Gaddafi which was soon followed by what appears to be his execution-style murder by his captors. When U.S. soldiers captured Saddam Hussein during the Presidency of George W. Bush, he was taken prisoner, handed over to Iraqi authorities and eventually tried, convicted and executed by them. President Bush has long been excoriated by liberals and leftists as a "war criminal", yet U.S. troops showed excellent restraint and control when arresting Saddam. Now various groups around the world are calling for an investigation into what, according to video of the event,...

The brutal end of Moammar Gadhafi was foretold. It is an end that despots want to cheat, and some do, as Stalin and Mao did. But Gadhafi became a hunted man, and it was only a matter of time when the hunt for him was over. It was Gadhafi’s misfortune to fall into the hands of his tribal foes, unlike the Iraqi despot. Saddam Hussein was, ironically, lucky to be found by American soldiers instead of being trapped like a hunted animal, and his life extinguished as mercilessly as he had killed his opponents. There is none despised more in...

And in a butcher shop (!) What's up next, string 'em from a bridge...? They were screaming "Allahu Akbar" when they finished him off- just like Al Qaeda does it, how bout that. While we still do not know who the rebels we just boosted to power actually are (yet plenty of reason to suspect the worst- i.e. packed with AQ and Muslim Brotherhood types), hey, we're about to find out.  Alas, so far-so bad, as they're already committing war crimes, up to and including summary executions... which appears to be just what happened to ole Muammar and out-of-luck son Mutassim. The UN and ICC suspect as much, as...

First accounts are almost never correct, but if the circumstances of Libyan Col. Muammar Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi's death prove to be as reported, they will provide yet another, final irony in a life replete with them. The man whose success relied upon a combination of great-power manipulation and the ability to sustain the fantasy that he embodied the aspirations of his people succumbed in the end to a combination of great-power military intervention and the genuine aspiration of his people for a future free of his vicious domination. Gaddafi's passing brings with it a welter of thoughts and observations. The...

(Reuters) - Russia believes that Muammar Gaddafi should have been treated as a prisoner of war according to the Geneva Conventions and should not have been killed, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday, calling for an investigation into his death. "We have to lean on facts and international laws. They say that in a course of armed conflicts international humanitarian rules written in Geneva conventions are enforced," Lavrov said in a radio interview. Gaddafi died in unclear but bloody circumstances shortly after the fugitive former strongman was captured by transitional government forces on Thursday, two months after he was...

U.S. Senator John McCain has compared Russia and Libya, saying that Muamar Gaddafi's death should worry the Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, according to Gazeta.ru. "Dictators in all countries, including Bashar al-Assad and, possibly, Mr. Putin and some Chinese leaders should be worried. I think this is spring, but not only the Arab Spring," McCain said during the BBC's Newsnight show.

"Kampala 'mute' as Gaddafi falls," is how the opposition paper summed up the mood of this capital the morning after. Whether they mourn or celebrate, an unmistakable sense of trauma marks the African response to the fall of Gaddafi. Both in the longevity of his rule and in his style of governance, Gaddafi may have been extreme. But he was not exceptional. The longer they stay in power, the more African presidents seek to personalise power. Their success erodes the institutional basis of the state. The Carribean thinker C L R James once remarked on the contrast between Nyerere and...

In what might be called the Obama Doctrine, but won't be because it isn't one and we were leading from behind anyway, the nation's top community organizer has helped NATO reorganize another bad guy from the world scene. Thirty-one weeks after Nobel Peace Prize winner Obama promised that the Libyan military operation would last "days not weeks," Muammar Gadhafi is dead, along with hundreds of fighters and civilians on both sides. The dictator lasted through 42 years of international insoucance, ever since Obama was a sixth grader. But near the beginning of the Arab Spring earlier this year Gadhafi made...

Latest estimates on Gaddafi’s wealth, could even top Mubarak, making him one of the richest people in the world, now estimated could exceed £80 Billion ($128 Billion). He has widespread business activities and financial investment assets in many countries, including Spanish real estate, of course many Italian investments, including their media, sport and banks. Also in excess of $1.6 Billion of assets in UK alone...

The final end of Libya's Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. While you do not see Gaddafi assassinated, you do see him still alive in the first video. He is even fending off his captors who have him. Then near the end of the video, you will hear gunshots. In the second video you will see that Gadaffi is dead, and hear the rebels celebrate by shooting their weapons in the air. They also show his now lifeless body. So be warned, because both videos are graphic and could be very disturbing to see. Follow this link to see Gaddafi's End

According to Libyan military officials, Saif al-Islam, the influential son of slain ruler Muammar Gaddafi is in critical condition and has been hospitalized after losing his arm. This follows reports of Saif al-Islam being arrested in Libya's coastal city of Ziltan after receiving injuries in his lower back and earlier accounts suggesting his death. Saif al-Islam's brother Mo'tassim Gaddafi was also recently found dead in the city of Sirte, after National Transitional Forces (NTC) overcame Gaddafi loyalists in the northern coastal city. Libya's Interim Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril has called on neighboring Algeria to hand over members of Gaddafi's family,...

First allow me to establish that I am glad the world is rid of Gaddafi. He was a tyrant and a terrorist. “Sic Semper Tyrannis!” It cost Americans a little over a billion dollars to send Mr. Gaddafi to his eternal reward where, no doubt, he is stoking the furnaces as we write. But this is not the end. In fact, it is the “beginning of the beginning.” I have never been totally satisfied that a democratic form of government will actually work in an Islamic country such as Libya, or Iraq or even Afghanistan, for that matter. They are...

Iraqis watching news of the death of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi remembered how their own dictator Saddam Hussein was ousted, fearing Libyans might now face years of factional violence as they did after Saddam's capture and execution. Gaddafi's death while trying to flee in a convoy Thursday came after eight months of war between Gaddafi loyalists and NATO-backed rebels who took the capital from the deposed leader two months ago. After the 2003 U.S. invasion that ended his rule, Saddam went on the run for months before he was dragged from a hole in the ground, put on trial and...

Col Gaddafi killed: Condoleezza Rice recounts his 'eerie obsession' with her Colonel Muammar Gaddafi had a "slightly eerie obsession" with Condoleezza Rice, describing her as his "African Princess," the ex-US secretary of state said in an excerpt from her memoirs published on Thursday. 12:53AM BST 21 Oct 2011 The late Libyan leader met Ms Rice in the oil-rich north African country in September 2008, a historic meeting that signalled the once pariah state's return to the diplomatic table after decades of isolation. Ms Rice, unlike ex-British prime minister Tony Blair, declined to meet Gaddafi in his infamous tent, opting instead...

VENEZUELAN President Hugo Chavez expressed anger over the death of Muammar Gaddafi, calling it an "outrage" and saying the ousted Libyan strongman was a "martyr". "Sadly the death of Gaddafi has been confirmed," said Chavez, who had just returned to Venezuela from cancer treatment in Cuba. "They assassinated him. It is another outrage," the Venezuelan leader told reporters in the town of La Grita. "We shall remember Gaddafi our whole lives as a great fighter, a revolutionary and a martyr," he said. Chavez had defended Gaddafi since the start of the uprising against the Libyan leader's regime in February, and...

U.S. Interests: Dictator Moammar Gadhafi finally met his bloody end at a rathole Thursday, and Libyan crowds celebrated. President Obama praised the rebels, proclaiming: "You have won your revolution." Not so fast. If there is one thing that we ought to know by now, it's that getting rid of a dictator like Gadhafi is the easy part. Gadhafi was a monster, but a known quality. What's hard is ensuring that what comes after isn't worse. The cheers heard as Gadhafi's body was dragged through the streets are mere echoes of those that followed the downfall of the Shah of Iran...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama hailed Muammar Gaddafi's death on Thursday as a warning to authoritarian leaders across the Middle East that iron-fisted rule "inevitably comes to an end," and as vindication for his cautious strategy toward Libya. Obama joined U.S. politicians and ordinary Americans in welcoming the demise of Gaddafi, who was for decades regarded as a nemesis of American presidents, and also claimed some of the credit for the Libyan strongman's downfall. ... "This marks the end of a long and painful chapter for the people of Libya who now have the opportunity to determine their own...

Calling Obama a Muslim, Gaddafi once loved him. I wonder when the Obama sticker came off his limo and what he thought just before he died?