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Tuesday 17 May 2011

Tangling Webs

I haven't seen much on the following; there's this French ex-pat bit here and in the TAZ (in German). Not too many seem to have picked this story up, which is already several days old. From the AP:
The French government has been tightlipped about the circumstances surrounding the death of Pierre Marziali, head and founder of SECOPEX Conseil... A rebel commander said Marziali was killed in an accidental discharge of a weapon as he was arguing about his team getting arrested. A statement from the rebels' transitional government Friday said four Frenchmen with Marziali were arrested for alleged "illicit activities that jeopardized the security of free Libya."
And the Expatica points out right at the top:
Libyan rebels said Friday that a French ex-paratrooper they shot dead and his four compatriots were not private security contractors but were in Benghazi to sabotage the anti-Kadhafi revolution.
And the German article also quotes the rebels as saying that the French security team was spying for Qaddafi.

When you're printiN' to fYT, things always look "murkier":
“We are very sorry for what happened,” said Gen. Ahmed al-Ghatrani, a rebel military spokesman, who blamed “gangs that the old regime used,” without providing additional details.
You gotta be careful when you're fighting the good wars, eh liberal media?

But you can't blame 'em for the lack of coverage on what seems to be a story about the only private military security firm in France being accused of double crossing the very people they were sent to protect by the President who got the ol' bomb dropping in Libya in the first place.

It's not the media's fault that Sarkozy's erstwhile competitor had to take his job to such a personal level.

And now that we know that the Governator was banging the help, I'm not even sure that's all that important.