Gaddafi teaches US on democracy
2006-03-24 09:03
New York - Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi lectured a United States audience on democracy and said Libya was the only real democracy in the world.
Via a video link, Gaddafi addressed an unprecedented gathering of US and Libyan academics prompted by a thaw in relations since the former Pariah State decided in 2003 to abandon nuclear weapons and took responsibility for the 1988 Lockerbie bombing.
He touted Libya's political system as superior to "farcical" and "fake" parliamentary and representative democracies in the West.
Gaddafi said: "There is no state with a democracy except Libya on the whole planet."
Libya 'state of masses'
Gaddafi said that Libya's Jamahiriyah system, under which Libyans could air their views at "people's congresses", was genuine democracy.
The US Central Intelligence Agency's World Factbook described Libya's government as "Jamahiriyah (a state of the masses) in theory, governed by the populace through local councils; in fact, a military dictatorship".
Gaddafi said his country's new openness would not lead Libyans to covet what they don't have - on the contrary, he said, the rest of the world would soon be emulating Libya.
He said: "Countries like the US, India, China, the Russian Federation, are in bad need of this Jamahiriyah system. This is a savior to them."
Congress 'better forum than newspaper'
Challenged by the US moderator about freedom of speech, Gaddafi said every Libyan was free to express his opinions at the congresses and that was a better forum than a newspaper.
Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East Programme at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, one of two US moderators, said some of Gaddafi's comments might have sounded jarring to Americans.
He said: "One of the hard things when you haven't talked to somebody for more than 30 years is we don't really understand how we sound to them and they don't understand how they sound to us.
"We obviously have a way to go until we're speaking the same language."