{"id":354596,"date":"2011-03-31T20:21:43","date_gmt":"2011-03-31T20:21:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/"},"modified":"2011-03-31T20:21:43","modified_gmt":"2011-03-31T20:21:43","slug":"could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/","title":{"rendered":"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><div readability=\"99.144637586094\">    <!-- KEEP --><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg.jpg\" alt=\"libya_b2bomber.top.jpg\" width=\"475\" height=\"254\" border=\"0\" class=\"cnnstoryImageFull\" \/><span><b>Air Force B-2 stealth bombers like this one participated in Operation Odyssey Dawn.<\/b><\/span><span id=\"fb-recommend\"\/><br \/>\n<span>By Charles Riley, staff reporter<\/span><span>March 31, 2011: 5:13 PM ET<\/span><!--startclickprintexclude--><br clear=\"all\"\/><\/p>\n<p>NEW YORK (CNNMoney) &#8212; In late February, President Obama issued an executive order that froze Libyan government assets worth at least $30 billion.<\/p>\n<p>One month later, the U.S. is engaged in a conflict that will wind up costing billions. And budgets are <a href=\"http:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2011\/03\/28\/news\/economy\/federal_budget\/index.htm\">obviously tight<\/a>. So could the government use some of that <a href=\"http:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2011\/02\/28\/news\/international\/gadhafi_libya_assets_frozen\/index.htm\">Libyan money<\/a> to pay for the war?<\/p>\n<p>Some on Capitol Hill think so. Rep. Brad Sherman, a California Democrat, said Thursday that assets seized from Libya and Gadhafi should be used immediately to pay for the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2011\/WORLD\/africa\/03\/31\/libya.war\/index.html?hpt=T1\">war effort<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>But not so fast. The U.S. didn&#8217;t really &#8220;seize&#8221; Libyan assets. Instead, the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/the-press-office\/2011\/02\/25\/executive-order-libya\" target=\"new\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">executive order<\/a> issued by Obama froze the funds in their current accounts.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Title &#8211; or ownership &#8211; of those assets remain with Gadhafi, his sons, or the government of Libya,&#8221; said Hal Eren, a D.C.-based attorney who spent eight years at the U.S. Treasury Department&#8217;s Office of Foreign Assets Control.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;In order to use those assets to pay for the war, the government would have to have the consent of the owner,&#8221; Eren said. &#8220;Which is probably unlikely given the circumstances.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>So for now at least, these assets are just sitting in U.S. banks, earning interest.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Treasury hits a button and everything is frozen,&#8221; according to Erich Ferrari, the founder of Ferrari Legal, a firm that specializes in trade sanctions. <\/p>\n<p>Not much is publicly known about the make-up of Libyan assets in the U.S. A secret diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks suggests that Libyan officials had spread around <a href=\"http:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2011\/03\/02\/news\/international\/Libya_investment_reach\/index.htm\">$32 billion in assets<\/a> to different U.S. banks in $300-$500 million chunks.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a pain in the neck for banks,&#8221; Ferrari said. &#8220;You have blocked accounts just sitting there.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>And really, that&#8217;s what Obama wants. The idea is that if Gadhafi falls, the next government will take control of the assets.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We will safeguard the more than $33 billion that was frozen from the Gadhafi regime so that it&#8217;s available to rebuild Libya,&#8221; Obama said on Monday. &#8220;After all, the money doesn&#8217;t belong to Gadhafi or to us &#8211; it belongs to the Libyan people. And we&#8217;ll make sure they receive it.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Rep. Brad Sherman thinks otherwise, and wrote a letter to Obama on Wednesday urging him to fully exhaust the frozen funds before passing on costs to the taxpayer.<\/p>\n<p>Before that could happen, the government would have to actually seize the assets &#8211; a process called vesting. And that&#8217;s not likely to happen.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;That would take a law being passed that is not on the books now,&#8221; Ferrari said.<\/p>\n<p>And it wouldn&#8217;t be a popular move.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There would be a great deal of uproar from the international community,&#8221; he added. &#8220;If we started doing that we would be hearing from a lot of people.&#8221;\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/money.cnn.com\/2011\/03\/31\/news\/international\/gadhafi_assets\/index.htm?section=money_topstories&#038;utm_source=feedburner&#038;utm_medium=feed&#038;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fmoney_topstories+%28Top+Stories%29#TOP\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/0e63013ebug.gif\" alt=\"To top of page\" border=\"0\" width=\"7\" height=\"7\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>First Published: March 31, 2011: 4:18 PM ET<\/p>\n<p><!--endclickprintexclude--><\/div>\n<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg-150x150.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Originally posted here:<br \/>\n<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/rss.cnn.com\/~r\/rss\/money_topstories\/~3\/kSTGYvXrQOw\/index.htm\" title=\"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war?\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p> Air Force B-2 stealth bombers like this one participated in Operation Odyssey Dawn. By Charles Riley, staff reporter March 31, 2011: 5:13 PM ET NEW YORK (CNNMoney) &#8212; In late February, President Obama issued an executive order that froze Libyan government assets worth at least $30 billion. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-354596","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-business"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war? - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war? - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Air Force B-2 stealth bombers like this one participated in Operation Odyssey Dawn. By Charles Riley, staff reporter March 31, 2011: 5:13 PM ET NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- In late February, President Obama issued an executive order that froze Libyan government assets worth at least $30 billion.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ghanamma\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ghanamma\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"\",\"@id\":\"\"},\"headline\":\"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war?\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-03-31T20:21:43+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/\"},\"wordCount\":515,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Business\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/\",\"name\":\"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war? - Ghanamma.com\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2011-03-31T20:21:43+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/03\/94ab3d712bomber.top_.jpg.jpg\"},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/\",\"name\":\"Ghanamma.com\",\"description\":\"News In Ghana - Latest Ghana News Headlines\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war? - Ghanamma.com","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/03\/31\/could-frozen-libyan-assets-pay-for-the-war\/","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_title":"Could frozen Libyan assets pay for the war? - Ghanamma.com","twitter_description":"Air Force B-2 stealth bombers like this one participated in Operation Odyssey Dawn. 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