Tony Blair with Colonel Muammar Gaddafi in 2007.
Picture: PETER MACDIARMID/AFP
Transcripts of two telephone conversations between the two leaders which took place on February 25, 2011, are made public
Colonel Muammar Gaddafi issued a 'prophetic' warning to Tony Blair that jihadists would attack Europe if his regime was allowed to collapse, phone conversations reveal.
Gaddafi's dire prediction was made in two desperate telephone calls with Mr Blair on February 25, 2011 - as civil war was engulfingLibya.
In the first call at 11.15am, Gaddafi said: "They [jihadists] want to control the Mediterranean and then they will attack Europe."
Excerpt from Col Gaddafi's 2011 phone conversations with Tony Blair
In the call, lasting half an hour, Gaddafi insisted he was trying to defend Libya from al-Qaeda fighters. The presence of al-Qaedas would later be superceded by the rise of theso-called Islamic State.
"We are not fighting them, they are attacking us, " he said, "I want to tell you the truth. It is not a difficult situation at all. The story is simply this: an organisation has laid down sleeping cells in North Africa. Called the Al-Qaeda Organisation in North Africa... The sleeping cells in Libya are similar to dormant cells in America before 9/11.
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