TRIPOLI, Libya - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Libya, becoming the highest-ranking American official to visit the North African country in more than a half-century and opening a new chapter in U.S. relations with the one-time pariah state.

Rice touched down in Tripoli on Friday for talks with Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi to mark the change after five years of halting but steadily improving ties that began when Libya abandoned weapons of mass destruction and renounced terrorism in 2003.