IPRIS

Paulo Gorjão, "Fate and Freedom: Portugal and the European Financial Crisis", in Theodore Couloumbis, Andrea Dessì, Thanos Dokos, Paulo Gorjão, Ettore Greco, Dimitris Katsikas, Charles Powell, and Dimitris A. Sotiropoulos, Southern Europe in Trouble: Domestic and Foreign Policy Challenges of the Financial Crisis (GMF/IAI, Mediterranean Paper Series 2012), pp. 41-47.

Table of Contents:
Tobias Schumacher and Paulo Gorjão, "Editors' Note"
Isabelle Werenfels, "Promoting the "good Islam": the regime and Sufi-Brotherhoods in Algeria"
Jean-Pierre Cassarino, "Unauthorized migration: another agreement between Italy and Tunisia?"
Larbi Sadiki, "The clay 'tiger': Tunisia and the end of the 'bread' economic model"
Daniel Nethery, "France and the Libyan intervention"

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Table of Contents:
Eva Wegner and Miquel Pellicer, "Prospects for a PJD – USFP alliance in Morocco"
Hannes Bahrenburg and Thomas Richter, "The show must go on: Questions of legitimacy give way to more pressing issues in Mauritania"
Francesco Tamburini, "Italy and the Maghreb: So far and yet so close"
Isaías Barreñada, "Spain and Morocco: Good partners and badly matched neighbors"
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By Diogo Noivo

Muammar Gaddafi’s first official visit to Italy took place in June 2009. It happened at a time when the relationship between both countries was in the process of improving significantly: in fact, Italy had become Libya’s main trading partner. Given this particularly positive context, one would expect that Colonel Gaddafi would take the opportunity to narrow differences and mitigate tensions in order to mend bilateral ties and further develop this new, lucrative status quo. However, Colonel Gaddafi has a very particular political rationale: He decided to land in Rome wearing a photo of a Libyan who was executed by Italian colonial authorities. In November of that same year, in another display of his idiosyncrasies, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi invited hundreds of attractive Italian "hostesses" to a villa in Rome for an evening during which he urged them to convert to Islam and told them Christianity was based on a fraud.

Colonel Gaddafi’s official visits and public statements are controversial by definition. Therefore, despite the discomfort caused by Gaddafi’s statements and actions during his last visit to Italy, no one was really surprised. As in 2009, this visit also takes place at an important diplomatic moment for Libya, although for different reasons. Libya is currently under pressure due to the release of Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the sole person convicted for the Lockerbie terrorist bomb attack. The veracity of al-Megrahi’s cancer and an alleged deal with BP are some of the many contentious topics surrounding the issue.

Despite every effort to reintegrate Libya into the international community (and the political price the West has paid and still pays for it), Gaddafi did not change his political attitude. Apparently, he is interested in benefiting from international overture without making the slightest political concession.

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