Michael Libal

Michael Libal (born April 25, 1941 ; † November 17, 2012 ) was a German diplomat .

Life

His father was the Southeast Europe correspondent of the DPA, Wolfgang Libal (born May 21, 1912 in Prague, † 2008 in Vienna).

Michael Libal studied history , political science , sociology and wrote his dissertation : Japan's way to war. The foreign policy of the Konoye cabinets 1940/1941. (published by Droste, Düsseldorf, 1971). He was accredited to the embassies of the Federal Republic of Germany in Moscow and Rome.

At the time of the hijacking of the plane “Landshut” in 1977, the ambassadorial post in Mogadishu was orphaned; Libal worked as interim charge d'affaires . On October 17, 1977, he held talks with the hostage-takers' leader, Zohair Youssif Akache, alias Captain Martyr Mahmud, at Mogadishu airport on behalf of the local Minister of State Hans-Jürgen Wischnewski . Libal was in the control tower and was talking by radio to the Lufthansa Boeing cockpit. He was significantly involved in the delaying tactic that ultimately led to the hostage liberation and repeatedly presented the hijacker with false news that German terrorists had started in a plane in Germany and were on their way to Mogadishu or had already arrived.

"Mr. Libal told him [Mahmud] that the West German government was bowing to his demands. He said the prisoners of the Baader-Meinhof gang would be released and taken to Mogadishu, but admitted that it would take some time to get there. The kidnapper was furious at the delay, and the following exchange followed:

Mahmud: How far is that?

Libal: I don't know.

Mahmud: Well, I know, and you should hurry to find out. "

In reality, this conversation, which lasted about seven hours, served to wait for darkness to fall: shortly after midnight, the GSG 9 attacked the federal police , killed Mahmud and freed the hostages.

At the beginning of the 1990s, at the time of the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia , Michael Libal headed the Southeast Europe Department in the Foreign Ministry of the Federal Republic of Germany. From 2001 to 2005 he was ambassador to Prague.

Michael Libal was married.

Publications

• Japan's way to war. Foreign policy of the Konoye cabinets 1940-41. Düsseldorf 1971.
• Limits of persuasion. Germany and the Yugoslav Crisis, 1991-1992. 1997
• The Balkan Dilemma. An Interpretation of the Crisis. In: Harvard International Review. Volume 18, No. 2, Spring 1996
• Germany and the Yugoslav Crisis, 1991-1992. Praeger, 1997
• Njemacka politika i jugoslavenska kriza 1991-1992.
• Basic questions of the Yugoslavia crisis from a German perspective.
• Yugoslavia and the Serbian Challenge 1991/1992.
• Reform policy and system competition. Gorbachev's attitude.
• The Road to Recognition. Germany, the EC and the disintegration of Yugoslavia 1991
• Ethnic Conflict in the Balkans and in the Caucasus. In: Journal of Southeast European and Black Sea Studies. Volume 2, No. 2, May 2002.

Individual evidence

1. ^ ÖBV events: Wolfgang Libal - Witness at the fence of time. Archived from the original on July 24, 2008 ; accessed on May 7, 2017 . 
2. ^ New York Times , October 19, 1977, p. A15, translated from the American
3. ↑ The 97-minute English recording of the radio is in several ARD sound archives , including the WDR under the signature 10022100. According to Libal, there is a complete audio recording of the Americans, but he does not know the origin. Presumably there were representatives of the US secret service in Mogadishu.
4. ↑ Libal's role after the hostage rescue in the world on July 30, 2009
5. ^ Christian A. Nielsen: Review by Michael Libal: Limits of Persuasion. Germany and the Yugoslav Crisis, 1991–1992. Praeger, Westport, Conn. and London 1997, ISBN 0-275-95798-5

predecessor	Office	successor
Horst Becker	Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany in Mogadishu / Somalia 1977	Cornelius Alexander Metternich
	Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany in Almaty / Kazakhstan –2001	Andreas Rüdiger Körting
Hagen Graf Lambsdorff (born December 20, 1935)	Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany in Prague / Czech Republic August 22, 2001 - June 15, 2005	Helmut Elfenkämper