Headed for the Egypt-Libya border at Salloum?

At this moment, foreign correspondents from around the word are headed for the town of Salloum (sometimes spelt Saloum or Salloom).   Apparently, at this hour, the Libyans have abandoned checkpoints on the other side of Egypt's Salloum border check point, and anyone can enter the country. 

A little over a year ago, I made a journey to this outpost in the Sahara desert.  I'm posting an exerpt from my travel journal and some photos I took.   One thing that anyone headed for Libya by way of Egypt needs to keep in mind is that the border is heavily mined.   So if you don't pass into Libya via the checkpoint at Salloum, you may be taking a very big risk.

First entry in Jotman's journal:

Few things depress me more than the sight of new seaside holiday resort towns on the coast of the Mediterranian.  The coast of Egypt is one private resort after another.   Blocks of 16 unit towers, names like Maadii, Marassi, Al-Karma, Emirate Hights.  A resort called "Marina" stretched for miles and miles.     One of the classiest resorts was called "Armed forces resort."

Here's my photo of the Armed Forces Resort.  It gives you an indication of the power of the army in Egyptian society, something that Egypt's pro-democracy movement may yet have to confront.

This Egyptian Armed Forces resort appeared the most luxurious of the many  resorts I passed.

My travel diary continued:

"Saloom" read a sign by the road.  We arrived at a checkpoint.   They asked for passports.

"Do you speak Arabic?"

"No, sorry."

"Why are you in Saloom?"

I was wondering if they would understand the truth: would they understand if I said I just wanted to see what's here? Probably not.

"I heard it is a beautiful place."

"No it is not." Both the guards were shaking their heads.

They escorted me off the bus into a room under the gateway.  One man was seated at a desk.  I walked in and shook his hand.

"Where from?"

"I came from Cairo."

I took out guidebooks, showed them on the map.   Back on the bus, the beduin gathered around.  No longer was I the anonymous foreigner.  I took a photo of one of the men.   Another made a long face.  So I took a picture of him too.  Smiles.

There's one hotel in the town.  Simple, but clean.  Overpriced, but given the lack of choice, that was to be expected.  Someone on the bus showed me to it.

The border checkpoints are up on the ridge.  Somewhere offshore lies a sunken Italian submarine.

Libya lies on the other side of the ridge.

My travel journal continued:

Rising shortly before sunrise, I walked aroudn Salloum.  My guidebook had said that the town of Salloum is located on top of the ridge.  It is not. The border station is on a point above a small harbor where a navy frigate was docked.  The border installation was large.  The border runs along a ridge high above the seaside town, extending into the desert.   The desert along the border is said to be mined.    I drank coffee waiting for the 9am bus back to Marsa Matruth.

The only taxis in Salloum are donkey-carts.  This photo depicts my early morning dash through town to the bus station.

Eco-friendly Salloum taxi service.

Back on the bus...

Good Bye read the sign on the border gate I had passed through late at night.  Another reception party at the checkpoint: a group of plain clothed guards.  I was escorted off the bus.    Examining my passport, they asked "where is your stamp from Libya?"

"I didn't go to Libya."

"Just Salloum?!"

Only WikiLeaks can save us

On the evening of the Egyptian revolution I found myself in the capital of another far-flung and potentially unstable outpost of the Empire.

As dusk approached, I walked past the country's yellow-brick parliament building. It was flanked by two flags, one of which was the flag of the European Union. The other, that of the Democratic Republic of Georgia.

A large number of policemen were assembling at this Tbilisi street corner. Police already lined an adjacent street.

Meanwhile, in front of parliament, a line of ordinary men and women was forming. Facing the street, many members of this predominantly middle-aged group of demonstrators held signs. With ten minutes, about two dozen protesters would appear.






Walking down the line, I inquired of the protesters if any spoke English. None said they did. A television camera began filming them. I took a few pictures.


The signs were all in Georgian. What could this be about? I asked two young passers by -- they looked liked they might be students -- if they could help me understand what was going on.

"They are protesting President Mikheil Saakashvili. They blame him for losing South Ossetia. They say he started the war with Russia."

I asked the students, Sue, an English literature major, and Alice, a sociology major, what they thought of the protests.

Sue replied, "I am apolitical."

Only later would the meaning Sue's comment become clear. The students were by no means disinterested in politics. Sue would do most of the talking with Alice listening carefully to our exchange.

I asked if Georgia was a democracy.

"No!" said Sue. Alice shook her head.

"Would you call Saakashvili, your president, a dictator?"

"Personally, I wouldn't go so far as to call him that," said Sue. "But that sign over there describes him as a 'totalitarian.'" She mentioned that another protester's sign called Saakashvili "a killer."

"You chose a bad time to visit Georgia," said Alice.

I asked why.

"This sort of thing," said Sue, nodding in the direction of the protesters. Sue spoke of the economic situation: "Food is too expensive to buy. People don't earn high enough. Low salaries."

Alice blurted out, "Low salaries? Sue, tell him it's not that we don't earn adequate salaries, it's that people can't get jobs!"

Georgia's official rate of unemployment for 2009 was 16.4%.

The students suggested that Georgia's most pressing problem was that the 2008 confrontation with Russia had cost Georgia access to it's major trading partner. The border with Russia had remained closed. Armenia, another of Georgia's neighbors, was a client-state of Russia. Georgia's only friendly neighbors were Azerbaijan and Turkey, now its largest trading partner.

We talked about Georgia's relationship with America. Sue saw no evidence that Georgia's friendship with America had made life better for ordinary Georgians: "If the cost of being too close to America is alienating Russia, then it's not worth it for us. Georgia needs trade and good relations with Russia. We should not side with America or Russia, but stay in the middle."

I asked what they hoped might help save Georgia.

"Wikileaks!" said Sue. Alice agreed.

Their sense of conviction on this point startled me. "How can Wikileaks help Georgia?"

"The media is biased. We need Wikileaks to expose the corruption in government, what's really happening. The public needs the facts."






Sue said the opposition party in parliament was small and seemed to side with the government on many issues. The nation's main media sources, Sue added, were controlled either by the government or the opposition party.

"If you watch our television, you'll see there's seldom any bad news. Stories critical of the government simply don't get told."

I asked Sue and Alice if the protests in Egypt would inspire the Georgians.

"Nobody would support us if we protested" replied Sue.

"You're saying protests like those taking place in Egypt could not happen here in Georgia?"

"Well, the revolution in Egypt is failing" said Sue.

Today, in Egypt, the Army had just announced that it supported Egyptian president Mubarak. Sue's pessimism mirrored that of most observers at this hour. Although within the next three hours, Hosni Mubarak would step down, few dared conceive this was just about to happen. For anyone closely following the situation in Egypt, this was one of the darkest, least hopeful hours of the eighteen-day-long Egyptian struggle.

"People here are afraid to protest," Sue said. I asked why.

"They go to jail."

Sue explained that in 2010 some students had held a protest and they had yet to be released.

"Some Georgian protesters are still in jail?"

"Yes."

When I asked the two students if they would consider joining a protest, Sue said protesting would be pointless because "the opposition party is just as bad."





Night was falling, and the protesters were dispersing, but I had one more question: "What's with the European Union flag?"

They giggled.

"Yes, our government is strange!"
__
Note: The protest described here was not reported in any English language news source but for one Russian publication which provided background about the rally's organizers and motives. The protest coincided with an important speech to parliament by the Georgian president.

The names of the two students were changed to protect their identities.

Russia has a new hero

Combing Russian language media sources, JOTMAN.COM contributor Sanjuro reports:

One of the most discussed topics of the last 1-2 days (655 comments and growing on Gazeta.ru - usually over 100 is considered popular) is an interview with a Russian court official, an aide to the Judge Viktor Danilkin who recently announced the latest verdicts for Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Platon Lebedev. The interviewed official who now fears being fired (and more) says there was tremendous pressure on Mr Danilkin from his superiors at the Moscow City Court (Mosgorsud) who literally controlled his every move to ensure the right verdict for Messrs Khodorkovsky and Mr Lebedev.

Looks like Natalya Vasilyeva, the interviewed official, has become an overnight celebrity in the Russian internet. Most readers praise her courage in coming out and speaking to the media. Many also suspect it's part of some scheme e.g. Medvedev faction vs Putin faction, or whatever one may imagine.