Muammar Gaddafi was supposedly killed by a baying mob last week, having survived successive bombing raids on his residences in Libya by NATO, whose rationale was that Gaddafi was "threatening to kill his own people."

But what do we really know about the man who defied Western criticism and propaganda for over 40 years and transformed Libya from the poorest nation on Earth into Africa's richest?

This interview he gave to Al Jazeera in 2009 during his visit to the UN in New York suggests that far from being an evil, rambling madman, Gaddafi is (or was) one of the few world leaders who actually knows what he's talking about.


There is much for those of us in 'the West' to ponder from this interview, not least fake democracy vis a vis Libya's participatory democracy which Gaddafi envisioned as a model for the rest of the world.

But did you also notice Gaddafi's carefully measured comments about WMDs and Iran?

Something that has really stood out during this season's ritual slaughter of Muslims by Western powers has been Iran's full support for the NATO bombing. "The Great/Little Satan" and the "Mad Mullahs" in bed together! What is UP there?