THE U.S. Consulate building in Benghazi was set ablaze on September 11, 2012 during a protest against a film produced by a little-known Egyptian immigrant, Sam Bacile, a Coptic Christian in the United States and featured on You Tube. The flames came from an attack by an armed group, involving the use of a rocket-propelled grenade on the Embassy building. In the sad event, Christopher Stevens, the newly-installed U.S. Ambassador to Libya, was killed along with three other staff of the consulate. Stevens died of smoke inhalation during the attacks, after protesters lobbed grenades at the compound. The Libyan security forces had battled to secure the compound for two hours and also tried to rescue the ambassador, who had survived the brutal war last year as the U.S. wartime envoy to the rebels' National Transitional Council. EALIER, Egyptian protesters had gathered at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo in protest over the same video, titled 'The Innocence of the Muslims'. The Cairo protesters pulled down the U.S. flag and in its place raised a black flag that read: "There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his prophet" before Egyptian security forces sought to tame the crowd.The protest in Cairo, from where it spread to other parts of the Muslim world, was provoked by the primetime broadcast of the video which originally appeared on You Tube by a private satellite television.THUS, from Cairo, the protest of the video has spread to some parts of the North Africa, the Middle East and now Kano and Kaduna states in Nigeria. In Khartoum, the German mission and the United Kingdom High Commission buildings were stormed on Friday, September 14, 2012 by protesters forcing them to be temporarily shut down. About 5,000 people gathered outside the embassy building and raised an Islamic flag above the mission. There have also been reverberations of the protests in Bangladesh, Yemen and Afghanistan. In Afghanistan, heavily armed Taliban fighters stormed a strongly fortified air base in Helmand province where Britain's Prince Harry is deployed, killing two US marines and destroying fighter jets and refueling stations. A total of 17 people have died in the violence linked to the film.THE United States has responded with a denunciation of the action of the attackers of American embassies with President Barak Obama expressing outrage at the incident and emphasizing that 'justice will be done'. The US has, however, repudiated the film which Hilary Clinton has described as 'disgusting and reprehensible'. The killing of an ambassador in Libya is a major international issue that is unprecedented since 1979, when Adolp Dubs was killed in an attempt to rescue him from his kidnappers in Afghanistan.The Libyan government on its part has described the event as a 'criminal act that will not go unpunished'. The Libyan President, Mohamed Magariaf has also apologised for the deaths and vowed that justice would be served. Although 50 suspects have been arrested in connection with the incident, the government of Libya must leave no stone unturned to bring the perpetrators to book. Furthermore, it must intensify efforts to bring the mountain of weapons abandoned by pro-Gadhafi militias under government control. The attack on the US Consulate in Benghazi shows that the government has found this a daunting task. Now, it has become an urgent task. Indeed, democracy in Libya today is faced with difficult challenges from fundamentalist and extremist individuals and groups. WE call on the US and its allies that have come under attack to exercise maximum caution and avoid any action that will provoke more anger and aggravate the situation. The US must recognise that the costly incidence in Libya is the consequence of a government that is trying to find its feet in an environment where democracy provides opportunity to give expression to emotions that have been pent up for over 40 years under Gaddafi's authoritarian rule. It must work with the Libyan government to build sufficient capability to control the public and to ensure that the perpetrators of the heinous crime are held to account. WE express our condolence to the United States, the family of Christopher Stevens and the other victims of the infamy in Libya.
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