I'm the king of kings: Gaddafi storms out of Arab summit and labels Saudi king 'a British product'

By Mail Foreign Service
Updated:

He has a well-earned reputation for unpredictable behaviour.

And Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's latest outburst - in which he declared himself 'the king of kings' and stormed out of a summit - has done nothing to dent it.

The Libyan leader was at an Arab gathering in Qatar yesterday when he seized the microphone to furiously denounce the Saudi king as a 'liar'.

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi speaks during the opening session of the Arab summit in Doha before storming out in a spat with the Saudi king

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi speaks during the opening session of the Arab summit in Doha before storming out in a spat with the Saudi king

When his Qatari hosts tried to quieten him down, Gaddafi  -  the current chairman of the African Union  -  insisted he would not be silenced.

'I am an international leader, the dean of the Arab rulers, the king of kings of Africa and the imam (leader) of Muslims, and my international status does not allow me to descend to a lower level,' he said.

He then got up and walked out of the hall. A Libyan delegate said he went to an Islamic museum for a tour.

Gaddafi ended Libya's decades of international isolation in 2003 when he gave up its pursuit of nuclear arms and renounced terrorism.

However, he has continued to antagonise other Arab leaders.

He has harboured a grudge against King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia since they exchanged harsh words in early 2003 over the imminent U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

'Now after six years, it has proved that you were the liar,' Gaddafi told Abdullah yesterday. He added that the Saudi ruler was a 'British product and American ally'.

The two are thought to have had a reconciliation last night.

Gaddafi's

Gaddafi's empty chair during the Arab League Summit

Last year, Gaddafi poured contempt on fellow Arab leaders at a summit in Syria, warning they might be overthrown like Saddam Hussein.

He boycotted a 2007 summit in Saudi Arabia, claiming 'Liza' - referring to former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice - had dictated its agenda.

When he visited Paris in 2007 Gaddafi brought 30 blue-uniformed women as minders, all supposedly virgins - and trained killers.

His 400-strong entourage arrived on five planes before heading to their luxury hotel, where Gaddafi pitched his heated tent in the grounds.

He was said to be bringing a Saharan camel with him in order to 'greet visitors in the true desert tradition'.

In 2005, Gaddafi told a summit in Algeria that Palestinians and Israelis are 'stupid'.

A year earlier, he sat smoking cigars on the conference floor of a Tunisian summit to show his contempt for the other leaders.

According to John Simpson of the BBC, this contempt also extends to journalists. He said Gaddafi has the rather unnerving habit of breaking wind loudly during interviews.

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