TRIPOLI (AFP) — The United States has opened a trade office in Libya to boost economic ties with the oil-rich state, the official JANA news agency reported on Monday.
It said the US assistant secretary for trade, Israel Hernandez, was at the official opening on Sunday with Libyan government representatives as well as businessmen from both countries.
The opening, exactly one month after a landmark visit to Libya by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, aims to ramp up commerce between the two countries, Hernandez said, according to JANA.
In August, the Libyan and US governments reached an agreement on a plan to compensate US victims of Libyan attacks and Libyan victims of US reprisals, clearing the way for the first visit by a secretary of state in 55 years.
US-Libya ties were suspended in 1981 when Washington put Tripoli on its list of state sponsors of terrorism. Libya was forced even further into isolation after the bombing of a US airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988.
The turning point came when Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi in December 2003 announced that he giving up weapons of mass destruction programmes following secret talks with the United States and Britain.
The US Congress, however, has been blocking the appointment of an ambassador to Tripoli until all American victims of Libyan attacks have been compensated.
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