History of Libya under Muammar Gaddafi passports for travel to Libya, and in March 1982, the U.S. declared a ban on the import of Libyan oil. Gaddafi reportedly spent hundreds of millions of the government's money on training and arming Sandinistas in Nicaragua. Daniel Ortega, the President of Nicaragua, was his ally. In April 1984, Libyan refugees in London protested against execution of two dissidents. Communications intercepted by MI5 show that Tripoli ordered its diplomats to direct violence against the demonstrators. Libyan diplomats shot at 11 people and killed British policewoman Yvonne Fletcher. The incident led to the breaking off of diplomatic relations between the United
1984 Libyan hostage incident shots from the Libyan People's Bureau. In 1986, a British businessman who had worked for Colonel Gaddafi's regime reported WPC Fletcher's killer had been hanged as soon as he returned to Libya. Following the breaking of diplomatic relations with Libya, the British Embassy in Tripoli was evacuated by the British and ransacked by the Libyans. A skeleton staff of British diplomats took up office in the Italian Embassy. 14–16 May 1984 Four further British men in Libya were rounded up and detained as hostages against the four arrested Libyan nationals in Britain by those claiming to be officials of the