U.S. lifts travel ban to Libya
From John King
CNN
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Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi has agreed to dismantle his country's weapons of mass destruction programs.
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WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Bush administration on Thursday lifted the U.S. government's 23-year-old ban on travel to Libya a day after Tripoli reaffirmed its responsibility for the 1988 Pan Am 103 terrorist bombing.
The Treasury Department on Thursday will issue a general license "for all travel-related expenditures in Libya," the White House said in a written statement. That means that American citizens will be able to spend money in Libya.
A prohibition on flights to Libya by U.S. air carriers remains in place as well as certain restrictions on transfer of U.S. funds to Libya, the Treasury Department said in a written statement.
The move was expected to come earlier this week, but it was delayed after Libya's prime minister said his country was not responsible for the Pan Am bombing, which killed 270 people.
That prompted the Libyan government on Wednesday to issue a new statement, saying it "accepts responsibility for the actions of its officials" related to the bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland.
A Libyan intelligence officer was convicted of the bombing, while another was acquitted.
Libya cleared the way for the travel ban to be removed after it agreed to dismantle its secret nuclear weapons program late last year. Since then, Libyan, British and U.S. officials have been meeting to discuss the issue.
In addition, last August, Libya sent a letter to the United Nations accepting responsibility for the bombing, and agreed to pay $2.7 billion in compensation to the victims families.
The United States imposed travel and other restrictions on Libya in the early 1980s. The sanctions were expanded after Libya was blamed in a 1986 disco bombing that killed two U.S. soldiers and a Turkish woman and wounded 229 others in what was then West Berlin. A U.S. ban on commercial contracts with Libya and travel-related activities to the nation were part of the expanded sanctions, which also included a prohibition on direct import and export trade.
The sanctions were expanded again in the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act of 1996, which cited Libya's failure to comply with U.N. resolutions, support of terrorism and efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction.
Late last year, Libya acknowledged it had a secret weapons of mass destruction program and agreed to dismantle it.
The Bush administration has said the United States will continue to assist Libya in dismantling its weapons programs and could support economic modernization and other reforms there.
As a result of Thursday's announcement, U.S. companies that had done business with Libya prior to the sanctions will be allowed to negotiate with Libya to re-enter the country, but companies must obtain further U.S. approval of any agreement, if economic sanctions are still in place.
"The United States will approach relations with Libya on a careful, step-by-step basis. We have made clear that progress in our bilateral relationship will depend upon continued, good faith implementation by Libya of its own public commitments on WMD, missiles, and terrorism," the statement said.
The United States also invited Libya to establish an interests section in Washington, "to lay the foundation for more extensive diplomatic relations in the future" and said it will beef up its U.S.-staffed interests section in Tripoli.
Earlier this month the United States dispatched a diplomat to Tripoli, establishing the first U.S. diplomatic presence in Libya in decades. (Full story)
In coming weeks, the United States is expected to send an American medical and hospital assessment team to address Libya's humanitarian situation and could welcome a team of Libyan educational specialists to the United States to explore future educational exchanges.
CNN's John King contributed to this report.
