Shukri ghanem biography of william

Shukri Ghanem, Libya’s former prime minister and oil chief, saw it as his mission to change his country from the inside, only to realise too late that Muammar Gaddafi would never accept any meaningful reform.

Ghanem died in Vienna, at the age of 69, a spokesman for the Austrian foreign ministry said on Sunday.

A fluent English speaker who was educated in the United States and worked abroad for years, Ghanem was one of the main reforming influences inside the Libyan administration for the past decade.

First as prime minister and later as de facto oil minister, he played a central role – often alongside the Libyan leader’s son Saif al-Islam – in ending Libya’s status as international pariah and opening it up to Western investment.

His plans were often blocked by an old guard opposed to reform and by a system where the interests of the Gaddafi family came before the state.

Ghanem was pushed out of the prime minister’s job by the old guard, and in l