smh.com.au The world watches as Libya wakes to challenges Paul McGeough August 27, 201 ' The new guard in Tripoli will be so flush with funds that they could rightly tell the world to go away - leave it to the Libyans to chart their own exciting future. How flush are they? Think $100 billion in frozen assets already being thawed for repatriation by Western capitals. Look at the quality of Libya's prestigious European investment portfolio - it includes chunks of London's Oxford Street, the Financial Times and the Fiat motor company. And don't forget the country's revenue stream from the world's ninth-largest oil reserves. It is hard not to share in the euphoria, especially in the Arab street, kindled by this week's fall of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. But world leaders would do well to proceed more cautiously than they did in the Afghanistan and Iraq ventures, despite the infectious excitement of the early days of liberated Kabul and Baghdad. Remember: what started in Libya as the humanitarian defence of the population of the eastern city of Benghazi became a full-blooded push for regime change. Now, with as many unknowns in Libya as there are stars in the North African sky, the country is the world's newest nation- building operation. For all the global determination to stand back, mission creep is upon us - even Julia Gillard wants to help. So the new Libya has become a series of tests, for players and pundits, from Tripoli to Paris, from London to Washington. GLOBAL REACTION Next week, the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, will host a gathering of Libyan and intemational officials in one of Paris' gilded conference rooms. The French leader's diplomacy will be measured by the extent to which all the Libyan wealth in the West and any further help that might be on offer can be leveraged to hold the former Libyan rebels to their democratic undertakings - without foreign governments taking ownership of the new Libya and its inevitable problems. The