Al Qaeda’s No. 2 leader threatens attacks on Libya

CAIRO — Al Qaeda’s No. 2 figure harshly criticized Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi in an audio recording released Saturday, accusing him of being an enemy of Islam and threatening a wave of attacks against the North African country because it has improved relations with the U.S.

In a 28-minute recording titled “Unity of the Ranks,” Ayman Zawahiri also said the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group was joining ranks with Al Qaeda.

“The Islamic nation is witnessing a blessed step. . . . The brothers are escalating the confrontation against the enemies of Islam: Kadafi and his masters, the Washington crusaders,” Zawahiri says.

The recording could not be independently verified, but it was posted on a website commonly used by insurgents and carries the logo of Al Qaeda’s media production house, As Sahab.

The recording also carries a message from Abu Laith al Libi, a Libyan Al Qaeda commander in Afghanistan who accused Kadafi of decades of tyranny.

“He is the tyranny of Libya and is dragging the country to the swamp,” Al Libi said in the recording, which was accompanied by old video of him walking with other masked gunmen.

“After long years, he [Kadafi] discovered suddenly that America is not an enemy . . . and is turning Libya into another crusader base,” said Al Libi, who has appeared in several recent Al Qaeda videos.

The U.S. had regarded Libya as a pariah state after Kadafi came to power in a military coup in 1969 and turned against the West.

Libya was demonized for sponsoring various terrorist groups and for trying to undermine pro-Western governments in Africa. Washington put Libya on a list of state sponsors of terrorism and imposed sanctions that barred American companies from doing business in the oil-rich country. In 1986, U.S. warplanes carried out airstrikes against Libya.

But the tide started to turn in 2003, after Kadafi’s surprise decision to dismantle Libya’s clandestine nuclear program. That year, Libya reached a $2.7-billion settlement with families of the 270 victims of the 1988 Pan Am bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, and the next year it paid $170 million in compensation to the families of the 170 victims of the 1989 bombing of a French UTA passenger jet over the Niger desert.

The U.S. resumed full diplomatic relations with Libya last year and removed the nation from the State Department’s list of terrorism sponsors.

The State Department also has praised Libya’s cooperation in helping the U.S. in the search for Al Qaeda and other terrorism suspects in the Middle East and North Africa.