Put Reagan on Trial, Libyan Urges : 2nd-Graders Get a Letter From Kadafi

Youngsters who wrote to Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi as part of a class project have gotten a reply in which he condemned last month’s U.S. bombing and said President Reagan “should be toppled and tried.”

“He told us stuff about President Reagan and how he doesn’t like him,” was the way Jestin Tyler, 8, described the letter that he and other second-graders at Maxfield Magnet School received Thursday.

In his letter to Kadafi, Jimmy Xiong had written: “Dear Col. Kadafi, I am so sorry that your little daughter died and can I ask you a favor? Could you stop bombing us, OK? And we’ll stop bombing you.”

“Dear Col. Kadafi, Why are you bombing the U.S.A.? Can’t you think of a better way to solve the problem? Well I can . . . Write letters!”, wrote Daniel Barbosa.

Kadafi’s typewritten reply was on white paper trimmed in green and decorated with Libyan political slogans written in Arabic, French and English. The grammar and spelling were imperfect. It was signed in Arabic script over Kadafi’s typed name.

‘Martyrs for Cause of Allah’

“Dear freind,” the letter said, “We received your kind letter in which you condemned the American barbarian aggression against our country and our people. We appreciate your deeply feelings towards us.”

The letter went on to praise Libyan bombing victims as “martyrs for the cause of Allah,” and urge that “children murders Reagan and (British Prime Minister Margaret) Thatcher should be toppled and tried.”

The letter defended Arab unity and Palestinian liberation and disavowed responsibility for terrorist actions in Europe and the Middle East.

The class also wrote to President Reagan but has yet to receive a reply, teacher Jill Swanson told the St. Paul Pioneer Press and Dispatch.

“I would expect we would hear from the President,” Swanson said. “I would hope we would get something more personal from him.”