Libya: Oil Main Goal Of NATO Campaign – Putin
By Ria Novosti
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Libya’s oil resources were the main object of the NATO-led military campaign in the country.
“Libya has the biggest oil resources in Africa and the fourth largest gas resources,” Putin said during a news conference in Copenhagen. “It raises the question: isn’t this the main object of interest to those operating there.”
Putin also sharply criticized NATO’s military actions in Libya on Tuesday, saying the North African state was being illegally destroyed by “so-called civilized society.”
“We must act within international law, with an awareness of our responsibility, with concern for peaceful civilians,” Putin told a news conference in Copenhagen after talks with his Danish counterpart. “And when the whole of so-called civilized society gangs up on one small country, destroying infrastructure that has been built over generations, is it good or bad? Personally I do not like it.”
This is not the first time Putin has publicly criticized the NATO-led intervention in Libya. In late March he made international headlines by likening a UN Security Council resolution to enforce a no-fly zone in the country to a “call to a medieval crusade.”
