Swiss President Doris Leuthard said last night that she expected the diplomatic spat with Tripoli to be over soon and added that she did not appreciate that Malta and Italy, fellow members of the European Schengen visa-free zone, had pressured Switzerland to lift visa restrictions on Libyans.
Progress was announced last night as Spain said that its Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos would fly to Libya today as the EU's representative, to try to fix the dispute.
Leuthard said she did not appreciate that Malta and Italy, fellow members of the European Schengen visa-free zone, had pressured Switzerland to lift visa restrictions on Libyans.
The row between Tripoli and Bern had proven to be "a test" of solidarity between Schengen zone members, Leuthard told the press on a one-day visit to Austria.
"This should be reexamined: every member of the Schengen zone is entitled to (impose) visa restrictions," she noted.
Switzerland issued a blacklist banning some prominent Libyans from entering the 25-state Schengen visa zone in the wake of a diplomatic row that began in July 2008 with the arrest in Geneva of Hannibal Gaddafi, the son of the Libyan leader.
On Thursday however, Bern announced it was ready to lift the Libyan visa restrictions.
Last month Malta and Italy had asked Switzerland "to accelerate negotiations with Libya" and to eliminate the blacklist, with the two countries later threatening to stop honouring the blacklist after April 5.
Tripoli also denied entry visas to citizens of the Schengen zone however, thus drawing the European Union, of which Switzerland is not a member, into negotiations between Tripoli and Bern.
The arrest of Hannibal Gaddafi, following complaints of mistreatment by two of his domestic staff, escalated over the following months with Libya detaining two Swiss businessmen, one of whom has since been released.
The other, Max Goeldi, has been blocked from leaving Libyan territory since July 2008 and is now serving a four-month jail term in Tripoli on visa offences.
During her official Vienna visit Friday, Leuthard met with Austrian President Heinz Fischer as well as Vice-Chancellor Josef Proell and Economy Minister Reinhold Mitterlehner.