Tripoli  - US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met with Libyan leader Moamer Gaddafi in Tripoli on Friday during her landmark visit marking the end of decades of frosty relations between the two countries.

Gaddafi welcomed Rice and her aides in a building in a government compound in central Tripoli. Photographers, who left the meeting hall after their first few shots, reported that Gaddafi was wearing a white Libyan robe decorated with a brooch in the shape of Africa.

There was no handshake between the two. As Rice entered the room, Gaddafi raised a hand to his chest in a traditional gesture of welcome, BBC reported.

After the meeting, Rice is expected to sign a few agreements and then hold a press conference.

Rice earlier met with her Libyan counterpart Abdul Rahman Shalgam to discuss ways to strengthen ties between the two countries, including economic cooperation and oil.

"We tackled several important issues during the meeting, like Iraq, Palestine, Lebanon, US-Syrian relations and Syria's role in the Arab world," Shalgam told the official JANA news agency.

Shalgam said Rice commented "on the progress of the relations between our countries and that presence of a deep political dialogue."

The visit is seen as the opening of a new era after more than half a century of strained US-Libyan relations. The last US secretary of state to visit Libya was John Foster Dulles in 1953.

Icy relations between the US and Libya began to thaw in 2003 after Libya abandoned its programme to produce weapons of mass destruction. Later, the US removed Libya from a list of countries that support terrorism, allowing for the exchange of diplomatic envoys in 2006.

The US hopes that Libya's changed behaviour will influence other countries, according to Jim Phillips, a Middle East analyst at the Heritage Foundation.

"Some within the US administration hope that this sends a positive signal to Iran and North Korea that they can improve relations with the US and other countries by following Libya's example," Phillips told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

"The US administration seeks to showcase Libya as a success for its non-proliferation and counter terrorism policies, since Libya gave up its weapons of mass destruction and disavowed terrorism," he said.

A couple of months ago, the US praised Libya for granting overflight rights to US aircraft on their way to Chad to end a blockade of the US embassy in the Chad capital, N'Djamena.

Rice's visit comes just weeks after Libya agreed to pay into a fund to compensate the families of victims of the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am flight over Lockerbie, Scotland.

Libyan intelligence was implicated in the plane bombing that killed 270 people, including 189 Americans.

Two years earlier, US president Ronald Reagan ordered airstrikes against two Libyan cities, Tripoli and Benghazi, to retaliate for the bombing of a Berlin disco that left two US soldiers dead.

Reagan's air raid killed dozens of people, including Gaddafi's adopted daughter.

Rice, who arrived in Libya after a brief visit to Portugal, is also expected to bring up the case of political activist Fathi al- Jahmi, 66, who has been detained without trial since
2004 and is reported to be in poor health.

Rice heads to Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco after departing Libya. (dpa)