International U.S., fearing more attacks on diplomats, closes Libyan post

Press, 9 February 1980, Page 7

International U.S., fearing more attacks on diplomats, closes Libyan post

NZPA-Reuter Washington [ The United States virtually closed down its ■ embassy in Libya yesterday fearing further attacks on i Americans there in the aftermath of a dispute between ; Libya and Tunisia, the State Department has said.

As the shut-down was announced in Washington, two United States Air force CoA planes landed, in' Tunis with 10 armoured personnel carriers for the Tunisian Army and a 041 was due to arrive with spare parts and ammunition, the Pentagon said. A small flotilla from the United States 6th Fleet consisting of three frigates and a guided-missile destroyer also was paying a routine port call in the Tunisian capital, officials said. The airlift of military aid follows the attack on January 27, blamed on Libya, on me southern Tunisian phosphate mining town of Gafsa in which 41 people died. Diplomatic sources said that the delivers fell within the normal 1 rarnework of cooperation between the United States and Tunisia, but observers added that it had been speeded up at the request of the Tunisian Government of Habib Bourguiba following the Gafsa attack. The diplomatic sources stressed that the aid illustrated the interest that the United States has always shown for the sovereignty, independence and stability of Tunisia with which Washington has had friendly relations since Tunisian independence in 1965.

State Department officials

said they feared that United ; States support for Tunis [would be likely to bring, [more attacks on Americans in Libya. Two French missions were attacked earlier this week by Libyan crowds protesting agains.t French aid to Tunisia. France withdrew its diplomats after the attack. The American mission in Tripoli was attacked and burned last December 2 by icrowds chanting support for the Iranian religious leader,

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeiny. I Six diplomats were withdrawn yesterday, leaving behind only an administrative officer and a communications aide, American officials said. The United States has been considering reopening the mission in Tripoli after receiving verbal assurances from Libya acknowledging responsibility for the earlier attack and pledging security for American diplomats in the future. “We are trying to follow through and obtain written assurances,’’ one official said.

“But the attacks on the French removed a great deal of the credibility of these assurances and we decided after the third incident in two months to close down."

Delivery of the 10 armourled personnel carriers — 1 flown from Barksdale Air I Force Base in Louisiana — ' was accelerated following America n-Tunisian con- : sultations last week. Twenty additional person-: '• nel carriers ordered by Tu- ’ nisia are being sea-lifted and 1 six UHIN helicopters will be flown in at a future date, a Pentagon spokesman said. . 1 The arms were ordered by ' Tunisia a's part of an SIBM • easy-credit purchase from , the United States.