SIGLES (7)

Mattia Toaldo (ECFR)
Imhemed Shaib (HOR)
Ahmed Huma (HOR)
Abu Bakr Baida (ex HOR)
Nouri Abusahmain (GNC and LROR)
Ali Zeidan (GNC)
Abdullah al-Thinni (Thanni) (GNC)
National Transitional Council (05.03.2011-08.08.2012)
Eleccions 2012 (07.07)
General National Congress (08.08.2012-04.08.2014)
Eleccions Assemblea Constituent (20.02.2014)
Haftar inicia Operació Dignitat al 16.05.2014, inici de la 2a guerra civil
Eleccions a la HOR (25.06.2014)
Finals d'agost  2014, cop d'estat islamista, que s'apodera del GNC amb seu a Trípoli.
HOR es trasllada a Tobruk (Setembre-Octubre 2014)
Signatura del LPA (17.12.2015)
Es constitueix el govern provisional del Government of National Accord (02.01.2016) a Tunísia
Es constitueix el Consell Presidencial (30.03 2016) a Tripoli
Es constitueix oficialment el GNA (05.04.2016) a Trípoli
El GNC anuncia la seva desaparició (05.04.2016)

As War Winds Down in Libya, Enter the Consultants

Security firms looking for a post-Iraq market flock to Tripoli

Sarah A. Topol

23.09.2011

Want to do a deal in post-Qaddafi Libya? Head to the Cafe Oya in the back of Tripoli’s Radisson Blu Al Mahary, where visitors without proper ID must check their AK-47s at the hotel door. Diplomats, reporters, businessmen, and representatives of the National Transitional Council (NTC)—the rebel government set up in February—sit at a dozen small tables discussing the country’s volatile future through a haze of cigarette smoke. Conversation over strong coffee flits between the fighting around Sirte, who will hold positions in the soon-to-be-created interim government—delayed by bickering between Islamists and secular Libyans—and who gets the billions of dollars of still-frozen Qaddafi assets.

Never far from view are the hulking frames of security details, mostly British ex-military men, transparent wires corkscrewing out of their ears. Their taciturn shadows tail the diplomats and visiting NTC members they protect.

Other security consultants are staked out at the hotel in search of the business that inevitably accompanies Mideast turmoil. One NTC insider compares the consultants to flies buzzing around. Contractors are trying to gather as much information as possible about anybody willing to pay—security companies, oil companies, business ventures who are already here or want to start here.

Scott Wilcox and Jonny Hart sit at a table wearing matching blue shirts with SicuroGroup emblazoned on the back in white letters. They’re collaborating with GardaWorld, represented in Tripoli by Andrew Gibson. The two companies have worked separately in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and Haiti. Wilcox, strategy director for SicuroGroup, and Hart are former Royal Marines; Gibson is ex-British army. While in the military they did tours in Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Albania, and Afghanistan.

GardaWorld’s parent company trades on the Toronto exchange, and it generated $1.2 billion in fiscal 2011 revenue by transporting cash from banks with armored cars, running airport security in Canada, and protecting oil fields and NGOs in tough parts of the world. In Libya, the two companies figure they can offer traditional security services for oil installations, reopened embassies, and aid missions. “We’re there to facilitate the reentry of clients in Libya,” says GardaWorld President Oliver Westmacott. GardaWorld is much larger than the privately held SicuroGroup, which had $11 million in revenue last year and is based in Dubai.

The companies also say they have a special expertise in tracking devices which, when affixed to vehicles or people, can help move personnel safely around a country rife with flashpoints. Tracking technology can also be used to help Tripoli’s city government develop a more effective ambulance system—one project SicuroGroup and GardaWorld are pursuing with a local partner. Both companies have experience bringing together security personnel, drivers, translators, and cultural advisers for special projects.

What’s missing from Libya for now is violence toward foreigners. “It’s not Iraq or Afghanistan, we understand that,” Wilcox says. Gibson adds: “We’re not here like these Guns ’R’ Us guys: They want a high-threat environment. We’re looking at the long term.”

The trio arrived Sept. 11 to set up their own operations in a villa, a compound where they’ve ensured security is good (but no blast walls like in Iraq), and services include Internet, TVs and DVD players, and housekeeping staff. They are scouting for other residences to turn into secure outposts for potential clients.

Being first on the ground comes with complications. SicuroGroup and GardaWorld need a business license: There’s nowhere to apply for one. “We want to be compliant. If you tell me there’s tax to be paid, I’m happy with it, tell me the rules,” Wilcox says. Yet, he adds, every official they speak with is afraid to sign anything now, for fear of being accused of abusing his interim power.

Wilcox says an NTC official has approached them to create a medical care and evacuation network. The idea is to connect the rebel forces besieging the pro-Qaddafi stronghold of Sirte to hospitals in Misrata. The tricky part is securing and insuring a plane to fly the seriously wounded from Misrata to hospitals in Amman or Rome. The cost of a flight can reach $300,000.

NTC officials are taking their time making up their minds about whom to hire for the medical evacuation service, while Wilcox and Gibson worry about whom they could trust to sign a legitimate contract. For now, there’s nothing to do but sit in the Cafe Oya and wait.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2011-09-21/as-war-winds-down-in-libya-enter-the-consultants

Security firms hustle in lawless Libya

09.12.2011

TRIPOLI, Libya, Dec. 9 (UPI) -- As rival militias in postwar Libya wage turf wars in Tripoli and the interim government struggles to form a national army, Western mercenaries are moving in to fill the security vacuum in the oil-rich North African state.

Under the circumstances, it's not surprising that the executive bureau of the National Transitional Council, striving to govern a country wracked by gunfire and political feuding, is giving these companies the time of day.

Western oil companies and other business groups hustling to get a piece of Libya's oil and natural gas wealth want protection before they start investing large amounts of money in the new Libya following the defeat and ignominious death of leader Moammar Gadhafi in an eight-month civil war.

"Compared to former Finance Minister Ali Tarhouni's rather hostile attitude, Libya's new leadership is showing greater openness toward foreign private security companies," observed the Intelligence Online newsletter, which has headquarters in Paris.

That may be because Libya's new government has still not been able to establish control over the country even two months after Gadhafi was killed by rebel forces and his brutal 42-year dictatorship crushed.

Heavily armed militias, which formed the ragtag rebel alliance that defeated Gadhafi's forces, with a major assist from NATO, are spread across the country, determined to control their home areas and defy the NTC.

These groups still have vast stores of weapons in the Mediterranean coastal city of Misurata 130 miles east of Tripoli, the capital.

The government has given the marauding militias until Dec. 20 to come under state control or face the consequences.

The main focus of the security companies is Libya's oil industry.

Oil is flowing at half its pre-war level of 1.6 million barrels per day and it will be some time before that improves given the security problems. So much of the rest of the economy is at a standstill.

Until international oil companies are guaranteed security by Libyan forces, they're not going to send back the thousands of foreign technicians who ran the oilfields before the uprising against Gadhafi.

Since Libya's new leaders have yet to succeed in creating a national army to protect the oilfields, Western security companies will have to fill the gap.

The oilmen are paying top dollar for security so they can repair damaged fields and get oil production going again.

Several weeks ago, London's HIS security consultancy was reporting that the NTC was unwilling to allow private security firms into the country. This, it said, "is acting as a brake on the country's resurgent oil production." That, however, appears to have changed as security slumped.

Leading the pack is Britain's Blue Mountain Group, which has been operating with Western companies in Libya for several months. It has received a no-objection certificate from the new Libyan authorities, Intelligence Online reports.

Foreign companies cannot work in Libya without a no-objection document, particularly with the state-run National Oil Co. and its joint ventures with Western oil companies.

The oil industry is a key sector for the security contractors. Many oil fields and facilities are in remote desert regions and are still prey to marauding Gadhafi loyalists and freelance gangs.

Blue Mountain took a major step forward in November by joining forces with a local outfit, the Eclipse Group.

Blue Mountain, like everyone else, is seeking to secure contracts with Libyan security forces to train the post-Gadhafi forces that the interim government is striving to establish.

Garda World, the international subsidiary of the Montreal's Garda Security Group, has also obtained a no-objection certificate.

Several other British outfits are also operating, primarily for Western clients.

These include Control Risks Group, one of the pioneers in the private security sector; the Olive Group and AKE, founded in 1991 by Andrew Kain, a former officer in the British army's Special Air Services Regiment that has spawned many private security outfits since the 1990s.

AKE specializes in protecting non-governmental organizations and journalists.

France is also represented by Gallice Security, run by Frederic Gallois, former No. 2 with the National Gendarmerie Intervention Group, the special operations unit of the French armed forces and known by its French initials GIGN.

http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Security-Industry/2011/12/09/Security-firms-hustle-in-lawless-Libya/75871323450621/