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Rice meets Gaddafi on historic Libya visit
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-09-06 08:32

Washington is negotiating a "military memorandum of understanding" with Libya but plans to sign a cultural and educational agreement on Friday were put off after Libya asked for changes to some of the language, a US official said.

Rice held back from visiting Libya until a compensation package was signed last month to cover legal claims involving victims of US and Libyan bombings.

Libya finalised the legal arrangements on Wednesday for setting up a fund into which money will be paid. But one senior US official said it would take "more than days" before payments could be made to both sides.

US victims covered include those who died in the Pan Am bombing, which killed 270 people, and the 1986 Libyan attack on a Berlin disco that killed three people and wounded 229. It also compensates victims of the 1986 US air raid.

Rice has come under some domestic criticism for making the trip before the compensation money was paid out. Rights groups are critical because some cases, such as that of ailing political dissident Fathi el-Jahmi, have not been resolved.

Appearing with Rice at a joint news conference, Shalgam said: "We do not need anybody to come and put pressure on us or to give us lectures on how we should behave."

He added that Jahmi had not suffered injustice and was not "under any kind of pressure."
Rice told the news conference she had raised human rights cases in her talks in Libya. She did not name the individuals she had discussed, but she was responding to a question about whether she had raised cases including that of Jahmi.

After spending eight hours in Libya -- three hours longer than planned -- Rice flew on to Tunisia as part of a four-day North Africa trip that includes stops in Algeria and Morocco.

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