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France breathed a collective sigh of relief yesterday as President Muammar Gaddafi ended a colourful six-day state visit that was meant to herald his return to international respectability.
The flamboyant leader left President Nicolas Sarkozy skulking under a dark cloud whose silver lining - sales of arms and planes to Libya - failed to outshine cross-party moral concerns.
Amid an internal party revolt, right-wing MP Lionnel Luca raised questions about the cost of the visit, during which up to 300 police and security staff were used to protect Gaddafi's 400-strong delegation, which included his troop of beautiful virgin female guards.
Former Socialist presidential candidate Segolene Royal joined other critics branding the visit a disgrace, saying Sarkozy had been "trapped by an unscrupulous dictator". Even Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner denounced Gaddafi's "pitiful" pronouncements on human rights after Gaddafi said there was nothing France could teach his country on the subject.
Sarkozy's closest aide, Elysee Palace secretary-general Claude Gueant, said the visit had produced sales of fighter aircraft and Airbuses worth €10 billion ($18.8 billion), "which means 30,000 jobs in France". But the figure was later revised to €3 billion and officials admitted that it was mainly "memorandums of intent to negotiate" that had been signed. They included the sale of 14 Rafales, an ageing fighter jet. Discussions were also held over the sale of 10 Tiger attack helicopters, six corvettes and a nuclear reactor to power a water-treatment plant.
To Sarkozy Libya is a linchpin in his plan for a "Mediterranean Union" to defuse tension with Muslim countries.
The security-obsessed Libyan leader's every whim was satisfied during the visit. Gaddafi pitched a Bedouin tent in the garden of the residence where he stayed. At Versailles he posed with a replica of Sun King Louis XIV's throne before going on a pheasant shoot in the Rambouillet royal wood.
Gaddafi also took a boat trip down the Seine, after insisting that all the capital's bridges be closed to traffic and pedestrians. On Thursday his bodyguards came to blows in the lobby of the Ritz Hotel with security personnel accompanying former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Libyan Foreign Minister Abdel Rahman Shalgham said the visit, Gaddafi's first since 1973, had been a success. "Libya's relationship with France goes back 600 years. Unlike other countries, such as Britain and the United States, France never broke off diplomatic relations with us."
Sarkozy denounced "those who excessively and irresponsibly criticised the visit".
- Observer
