...from the 'Lybia - Our Home' site

 http://www.libya-watanona.com/#n020208

Saturday, 2 February, 2008: Libya's $100 billion sovereign wealth fund will avoid buying U.S. assets because of politically motivated restrictions on investments by Arab states, Libya's top oil official said. The fund will consider buying stocks, bonds, real estate and banks in countries from China and Indonesia to Europe and Latin America, Shokri Ghanem, the chairman of Libya's state-owned National Oil Corp., said in Bloomberg Television interview yesterday evening in Vienna. ``The only market which is unfortunately not a pleasant market is the United States,'' he said. ``It's a very active market, but it is full of politics and unpleasant actions. In Europe, politics is not very much interfering in trade.'' Libya current prime minister, Basghdadi Mahmudi, said in a December interview that Libya is preparing to invest more than $100 billion abroad, joining the UAE and other oil-rich Arab states searching for int'l investments. U.S. lawmakers, citing security concerns following the Sept. 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Center, opposed DP World Ltd.'s ownership of six port terminals two years ago, forcing the Dubai- based company to sell them to American International Group Inc. [Bloomberg]