GADDIFI TOPPLED!!!!!TRIPOLI CELEBRATING!!!!!!!!

Washington Post:

Captured Gaddafi soldiers, including foreign fighters, tell of low morale
Posted on July 8, 2011 By: Ernesto Londono

Beleaguered by NATO’s bombing campaign, low morale and desertions, the Libyan army is relying heavily on fighters from sub-Saharan Africa as Moammar Gaddafi’s government struggles to beat back rebels forces east and west of the capital, captured fighters said in interviews.

Two Libyan army officers and three sub-Saharan African fighters captured by rebels after a recent battle in the country’s western mountains said Thursday that Libyan troops deployed in the area are running low on ammunition and fuel.

Military leaders, they said, are depending on the foreign fighters because many Libyan soldiers are conflicted about fighting their countrymen and have lost faith in the country’s longtime ruler. In interviews conducted separately at the rebel-run jail in Ziltan, the detainees said that as many as half the forces deployed by the Gaddafi regime to the front lines come from countries such as Niger and Mali.

The detainees’ accounts provide rare insight into the role foreign fighters are playing in Libya, as well as the fraying military strength of Gaddafi’s increasingly isolated government.

Gaddafi’s aides have denied that the government is using foreign fighters and have said the country’s troops remain strong and motivated. But the leader’s son, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, acknowledged in a recent interview that the Libyan military’s fighting strength is far from ideal.

“One of our biggest mistakes was that we delayed buying weapons, especially from Russia, and delayed building a strong army,” the younger Gaddafi told Russia Today, an English-language news network, last week.

Jamil, a Libyan military officer detained Wednesday after rebels captured the city of al-Qualish, said the foreign fighters were pushed to the tip of the front line as rebels began pounding the city with rockets, tank shells and anti-aircraft missiles fired horizontally.

“They shoot without hesi­ta­tion,” he said, sitting in the library of a school that rebels are using as a detention center.

Jamil and his men were cowered in fortified positions until the heavy weapons stopped battering the town, he said. When rebels streamed into the town on foot and cars, he considered whether to run back or surrender.

“I held my hands and surrendered,” said Jamil, who asked to be identified only by his first name for fear of reprisals against his relatives. “We want to stop this killing and we don’t have enough ammunition.”

He said Libyan soldiers in Gaddafi’s military don’t want to fight their countrymen. “A Libyan sniper can’t shoot a Libyan,” he said. “This job is for a non-­Libyan.”

Gaddafi has relied for years on non­-Libyans to shore up his armed forces, and analysts say he has intentionally kept his military weak, fearing that a strong, conventional armed force could stage a coup.

While the Libyan soldiers characterized their sub-Saharan comrades as fearless fighters who follow orders without hesitation, the three foreign fighters captured Wednesday said many of them were coerced to take up arms.

Issa Munir, 22, from Mali, said he moved to the southern Libyan city of Sehba a year ago to work at a farm. Last month, he said, he was among a large group of sub-Saharan African laborers who were taken into custody and moved to Tripoli. In the capital, government officials offered him Libyan citizenship in exchange for taking up arms for Gaddafi, he said.

“I couldn’t refuse,” said Munir, who was wearing olive green pants and a stained white V-neck T-shirt. “Most of us have the same story: We were brought by force.”

The other two non-Libyan men, both from Niger, said they lost low-paying jobs after the fighting started and joined the force willingly when officials promised them good salaries.

Ibrahim Saleh Youssef, 26, said he had been working as a cleaner for a Brazilian company in the south. “I didn’t have money to eat,” the lanky man said, speaking barely above a whisper. “I didn’t even have enough to buy cigarettes.”

After surviving a terrifying barrage of artillery and shelling in al-Qualish on Wednesday, he said he raised his hands in surrender as the rebels stormed in. “I didn’t want to kill any Libyans,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to hurt anyone.”

The men’s accounts could not be independently confirmed. Rebel jailers told the detainees they were free to speak to two reporters who arrived at the jail unannounced, but gave them the option to decline. Rebel leaders say they intend to hold the men indefinitely, but might consider a prisoner swap arranged by the Red Cross.

Another Libyan military officer, Abu Jelah Dau Afra, 38, said the armed forces still have soldiers committed to defending Gaddafi. “Some of them love him deeply,” he said. “Others are just afraid.”

NATO’s bombing campaign has significantly weakened Gaddafi’s military hardware, Afra said. But, he added, the alliance’s bombs do not appear to have killed many soldiers because they usually run away from tanks and other large weapons as soon as they hear fighter planes approaching.

Libya, which has vast oil reserves and a small population, has long been a magnet for laborers from poorer African countries.

A 27-year Libyan military veteran who was captured by rebels in the western mountains in April said fellow officers have long resented Gaddafi’s reliance on foreign fighters.

“Gaddafi has done this because he knew a dark day was coming,” said the man, who is also being held in the Ziltan jail and declined to give his name, citing fears about the safety of his relatives.

The Libyan government Thursday claimed that it is the rebels who are importing fighters.

Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Kaim told the Associated Press in Tripoli that the government has evidence that the rebels in the east are fighting alongside Colombian mercenaries paid by the United Arab Emirates and Western allies. He said the government would present evidence to support the claim.

Al Jazeera:

Zintan ready to keep fighting

Residents of remote town in western Libya will not accept anything less than the end of Gaddafi's government.
Last Modified: 08 Jul 2011 06:55

Nine rebel fighters have died in efforts to drive Libyan government soldiers out of the town of Qwalish.

Seven of the nine fighters who died on Wednesday were from Zintan, a remote western town of Libya.

The people of Zintan have always had a fearsome reputation. As rebel fighters against government forces, they have been at the forefront of efforts to make this mountain area safe.

They say that they will not accept anything less than the end of Gaddafi's government, even if this equates to their own death.

"We are fighting to die, they are fighting to live," is the slogan they chant.

Al Jazeera's Jonah Hull reports.

Al Jazeera:

Don't 'call us rebels'
By Sue Turton on Fri, 07/08/2011 - 11:52.

It was getting late for a foray to the front. There was perhaps an hour's light left in the sinking sun. Not much time to negotiate our way up there and back before dark.

But we had run into the same brick wall that was stopping all the media in Misurata from reporting at the frontline.

The military commanders had universally decided that the press did more harm than good after one of our colleagues gave away rebel positions in his report a couple of weeks earlier.

As we hung out at the makeshift hospital just back from the key checkpoint, one of the local tradesmen, who had supported the rebels with supplies since the beginning, lodged a complaint.

"Why do you call them rebels? They are not fighting men. They are civilians forced to pick up weapons." Mohammed was indignant.

"You need to tell the world that these men are normal people. Gaddafi has forced them to take up arms. It's a crime."

He wasn't an old man but the crags and wrinkles on his kind face spelt out years of hard work and worry. It was only when he began to recite Kenny Rogers songs that some of those years fell away.

We reached the frontline as dusk fell, the silhouettes of the 'rebels' crouched behind their sand berms just about visible in the pinkish glow, their cigarettes glowing red in the darkness.

The thuds and clatter of machine guns and artillery crackled along the line.

I hastily interviewed the nearest commander while we could still see to film. He explained how the fighting had gone that day, sketching out a map of their positions in the dirt, sounding every inch an experienced battlefield expert. After our interview I asked what he did for a living before the uprising.

"I was an engineer at the steelworks," he replied with a broad smile. Every rebel fighter I've talked to in Libya has said they plan to go back to their old jobs after the war.

But the longer this conflict takes to reach a conclusion the further that hope for a return to normal life is beginning to feel for this civilian army.

Al Jazeera:

Holidays in Misrata
By Sue Turton

We hit the beach today. Just for a couple of hours before heading back to the frontline.

I've not swum in the sea before with the distant thuds of shelling in the background. It gave us a taste of what life could be like along this beautiful coastline.

Beautiful clear turquoise waters and empty sandy beaches. But the soundtrack was more Apocalypse Now than Summer Holiday.

It’s not just the views that could make this a great holiday destination. The Libyan people are hospitality personified.

Everywhere we go in Misrata someone pops up with food or drink, whether it's freshly brewed coffee, hot pizza made at one of the triage stations or ice cream delivered to the frontline

We were shooting next to the burnt out wreck of the big supermarket in town a few days ago when a tray of cold water in a beautiful glass jug and freshly baked fairy cakes with a syrupy topping appeared.

Serving us refreshments was one of Libya's national football players who happened to live next door.

You can still see what a beautiful city Misrata once was in some of the residential neighbourhoods, with their streets of elegant villas in well-manicured gardens.

The Libyans have a penchant for topiary - I've seen dozens of trees in Benghazi and Misrata cut into squares or pyramids.

I think the topiarists must be fighting on the frontline in Misrata as the trees are looking a bit unkempt.

I'm told Tripoli Street was once a vibrant boulevard of busy shops, restaurants and boutiques.

If, one day, when this conflict has come to an end, you get the chance to visit this country I recommend you take it.

They'll welcome you with open arms.

http://feb17.info/

5:30pm: NATO warplanes bombed forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi in Libya’s Western Mountains on Friday at the front line where Gaddafi’s troops retreated two days ago from a rebel advance.

The bombs landed about three km (two miles) east of the village of Al-Qawalish, said Abdul Wahad, a rebel fighter manning the last checkpoint on the eastern edge of the village.

He said they struck four times in the mid-afternoon.

Rebels forced Gaddafi troops from the village on Wednesday in one of their biggest advances in weeks, pushing down the highway towards the strategic town of Garyan, which controls the main road south out of the capital Tripoli about 100 km (60 miles) away.

2:30pm: Hundreds of African migrants have been airlifted from government-controlled southern Libya and flown to the capital of Chad - the first air evacuation by the International Organisation for Migration since the Libyan war broke out.

Some 370 migrants, mainly Chadian, have been evacuated from the Libyan town of Sebha on three flights chartered by the IOM since Wednesday, the agency said on Friday.

2:00pm: Five Libyan rebels were killed and 17 were injured in fighting with forces loyal to leader Muammar Gadaffi near Misurata on Friday, medical workers said.

A Reuters reporter near the front line said rebels were coming under heavy artillery fire.

1:30pm: The frontline Libyan village of Al-Qawalish was a ghost town on Thursday, a day after it was seized by rebels, who said life may return to normal in the area after the exit of Muammar Gaddafi’s troops.

12:56pm: Turkey has frozen $1 billion worth of Libyan central bank reserves deposited in Turkish banks, the Star newspaper reported on Friday, citing Turkish foreign and economy ministry officials.

The move is part of U.N. sanctions against Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s government, the newspaper said.

Libya’s opposition National Transitional Council urged Turkey to release the reserves during a visit by Libyan rebel leader this week, Star said.

Turkey’s bank regulator issued a statement this week saying the state Savings and Deposit Insurance Fund had seized Libyan Foreign Bank’s shares in Turkey’s Arab Turk Bank.

Libyan Foreign Bank, a subsidiary of the Libyan Central Bank, holds 62.37 percent of Arab Turk Bank, which had 1.14 billion lira in assets in 2010.

Al Jazeera:

Benghazi rally to support west Libya 8 Jul 2011

They raised their voices for those who were not able to speak.

Thousands from across the rebel-held east Libya gathered in Benghazi on behalf of Libyans who are still living under Gaddafi's rule.

Apart from supporting their countrymen, activists say they also organised the Benghazi demonstration as a direct response to the pro-Gaddafi rally held in Tripoli last Friday.

Protesters chanted, "East and west is united", but, Libya is a nation still divided by battle lines.

Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr reports from Benghazi.

Al Jazeera - link as video not yet on you tube: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/07/20117941019938272.html

Gaddafi vows to take fight to Europe
Libyan leader gives fresh warning as artillery fire slows advance on two fronts by fighters seeking to end his rule.
Last Modified: 09 Jul 2011 05:42

Muammar Gaddafi has threatened to take the war in Libya to Europe while rebels come under heavy fire as they renew their push against his forces.

Thousands of Gaddafi supporters rallied in the Green Square in Tripoli, Libya's capital, for Friday prayers, underscoring his refusal to step down after four decades in power and five months of fighting.

Large numbers also turned out in the desert town of Sabha, 800km to the south, in an apparent attempt to show that Gaddafi still enjoys support in the areas of Libya he still controls.

In a speech on Libyan television, Gaddafi threatened to send hundreds of Libyans to carry out attacks in Europe in revenge for the NATO-led military campaign against him.

"Hundreds of Libyans will martyr in Europe. I told you it is eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth. But we will give them a chance to come to their senses," he said in an audio speech.

Ali Abu-Sowah, a religious preacher, told worshippers that Libya could implement reform without the intervention of the West and accused the rebels of being Western stooges.

"How can we allow such meddling when we see what happened in beloved Iraq and Afghanistan?" he said.

NATO has denied the Libyan government's charge that it has intentionally carried out air raids to aid rebel advances, saying it is sticking to UN mandate to protect civilian lives.

'Writing on the wall'

Gaddafi's threatening rhetoric contrasted with a prediction by Britain, one of the main backers of the campaign against Gaddafi, "the writing is on the wall" for him.

"I think it's heading towards a clear conclusion - eventually, we don't know when that will be, when Colonel Gaddafi realises that his departure is essential to the future of Libya and its people," William Hague, the British foreign secretary, told the Reuters news agency in an interview on Friday in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

"I think the pressure on the regime is increasing all the time. We have intensified the military campaign, it will be intensified further. The economic pressure is intensifying also, and so is the diplomatic pressure."

And in what may be the latest financial squeeze on Gaddafi, Turkey has frozen $1bn of Libyan central bank reserves deposited in its banks, a Turkish newspaper reported on Friday.

The developments on the diplomatic front came as opposition fighters on the ground took fresh casualties, after advancing on two fronts in the past two weeks against Gaddafi's forces.

At least six fighters were killed and 17 injured on Friday on the frontline near Misrata, on Libya's Mediterranean coast, according to local medical workers.

They had come under heavy artillery fire from Gaddafi's forces.

Approaching Zlitan

A rebel sympathiser in Misrata told the Reuters news agency that opposition forces had been moving closer to neighbouring Zlitan, one of a chain of government-controlled towns blocking their advance to Tripoli.

As they advanced, pro-Gaddafi troops inside the city fired rounds of explosives to block their progress, the sympathiser said in an e-mail.

"The rebels are waiting for NATO back-up or for Gaddafi forces to run out of ammunition to make a move to take the city centre," he said.
Click here for more of Al Jazeera's special coverage

On the other major front, in the Western Mountains region southwest of Tripoli, NATO jets bombed forces loyal to Gaddafi several times, their bombs landing about 3km east of the village of Qawalish, according to one rebel fighter.

After weeks of static fighting, the rebels made significant advances on Wednesday: pushing west from Misrata to within 13km of Zlitan, where large numbers of pro-Gaddafi forces are based, and seizing the village of Qawalish in the southwest.

Taking Qawalish brings them closer to having control of a major highway into Tripoli.

Rebel advances over the last two weeks have allowed normal life to resume in towns no longer in shelling distance of Gaddafi's troops.

Rebels staged a military parade on Friday evening in Zintan, one of the main towns in the Western Mountains. Children thronged the streets to watch the rebels drive through on tanks.

People fired rifles in the air including one small boy who opened fire with a Kalashnikov assault rifle while perched on his father's shoulders.

Telegraph:

Gaddafi army attacks supply route as rebels make advance
A sustained assault by pro-Gaddafi forces on a vital opposition supply route close to the Tunisian border is threatening to undermine a rebel advance on Tripoli.

By Ruth Sherlock, in Nalut 7:42PM BST 08 Jul 2011

After weeks of stalemate, rebel fighters have in recent days begun a two-pronged offensive, raising fresh hopes that opposition forces can regain the upper hand in their campaign to topple Col Muammar Gaddafi.

One advance from the city of Misurata, to the east of the Libyan capital, has made little progress. But Berber tribesmen in the Nafusa Mountains to the south-west of Tripoli are closing in on Gharyan, a heavily fortified garrison town 60 miles from the capital and strategically situated on Libya’s main North-South road.

The advance is being threatened by a sustained army assault on Wazin, the only border crossing with Tunisia that is controlled by the rebels, and the nearby Berber mountain town of Nalut.

If either were to fall, the Gaddafi regime would stand a strong chance of regaining control of the Nafusa mountains by choking off supplies to the rebels and starving their sympathisers into submission.

For now, government forces seem content to harry the two towns rather than take them. The regular bombardment is causing severe disruption in the distribution of food, fuel and provisions to fighters and civilian populations alike.

“The problem is the indiscriminate shelling,” said Mohamed Jernaz, a rebel official in Nalut. “Now there is a general deficit in our stores. Some truck drivers are refusing to come inside the area.”

Hiding behind rocks and in crevices, rebel fighters yesterday observed pro-regime forces in the towns below. A rebel who gave his name as Nadir, said: “Shells hit us this morning, and sometimes they fall on Tunisian villages too.”

Although more than 120 miles from the front line, this border supply route is the lifeline for a string of mountain villages vital to the rebel efforts. Recognising the route’s significance, Col Gaddafi has sent his elite Khamis Brigades, led by and named after his son, to recapture it.

Although they hold the higher ground, the rebels are more poorly armed than those on the front line because they have not benefited, they say, from Nato arms drops. The bombardment is also slowing the main rebel advance on Tripoli as they divert fighters to secure the border.

Although Nato is reportedly reluctant to see the rebels reach Tripoli out of a fear of mass civilian casualties, commanders remain keen that they continue to march towards the capital in an effort to persuade Col Gaddafi’s remaining acolytes to change sides and cause the regime to implode from within.

Col Gaddafi on Friday night threatened to send hundreds of Libyans to launch attacks in Europe in revenge for the NATO-led military campaign against him.

“Hundreds of Libyans will martyr in Europe. I told you it is eye for an eye and tooth for a tooth. But we will give them a chance to come back to their senses,” the Libyan leader said in a televised speech.

Now why do I think that any Libyans currently in Europe will be more than happy to NOT be martyrs for the Dear Leader?

bb1 wrote:Now why do I think that any Libyans currently in Europe will be more than happy to NOT be martyrs for the Dear Leader?

I think he's aiming to send them over, but has forgotten a small thing like security? He won't get them past Lampedusa if he's imagining sending them that ways, cos now he's broadcast it to the world, every security man will be on the lookout for anyone who just might be an Arab or whose papers are not in order. This kind of threat really does make me sure he is totally insane. LL

Good evening! Apologies for the late posting of items over the last 2 days, we are having a heatwave and I am leaving for cooler parts of the country very early in the morning and not getting back home until it has cooled down, being of the age when it is considered not a good thing to be over-hot. I will be doing the same tomorrow. LL

Al Jazeera Live Blog: Assorted items plus various photos: http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya

Ditto: http://feb17.info/

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Libyan girl records events of conflict in her diary

Al Jazeera English on 10 Jul 2011

The town of Yifrin in western mountains of Libya has gone back and forth between the rebels and the government forces. In April and early June, government forces managed to occupy the town for weeks before the rebels could push them out again.

For residents, the sound of rockets has become a constant part of every day life.

All Jazeera's Jonah Hull met one young woman who kept a diary of the days spent under siege.

Thanks, LL - that is a very moving video.
It's all too easy to forget that there are real, human beings, just like us, caught up in this.

Don't you go overheating!

Don't you go overheating!

34C today, 32C yesterday, possibly 36C+ tomorrow!! This happens every year so I jump in the RV and head north for the day and come back here when it's a bit cooler. LL

Good evening!

Al Jazeera:

Gaddafi regime 'in talks with France'
Saif al-Islam's comments came a few hours after French defence minister said the rebels should negotiate with Tripoli.
Last Modified: 11 Jul 2011 11:32

Muammar Gaddafi's regime is in talks with the French government, one of the Libyan leader's sons said in an interview published on Monday.

"The truth is that we are negotiating with France and not with the rebels," the Algerian El Khabar newspaper quoted Saif al-Islam as saying from Tripoli, the Libyan capital.

A spokesman for the French foreign ministry denied the government was in direct talks with Gaddafi but said "we pass [the Libyan regime] messages in liaison" with the rebels and other allied countries.

"These messages are simple and without ambiguity: Any political solution must begin with Gaddafi's withdrawal from power and abandonment of any political role," said spokesman Bernard Valero.

The opposition National Transitional Council (NTC) said it would not negotiate with Gaddafi until he stepped down from power. A spokesman said the Council believed Saif al-Islam was bluffing in order to harm relationships between the NTC and France.

But the French defence minister said on Monday that it was time for the rebel Council to come to the negotiating table with Gaddafi's administration.

"Our envoy to [Nicolas] Sarkozy said that the French president was very clear and told him 'We created the [rebel] council, and without our support, and money, and our weapons, the council would have never existed'," the newspaper quoted Saif al-Islam as saying.

"France said: 'When we reach an agreement with [Tripoli], we will force the council to cease fire'," the newspaper quoted Gaddafi's son as saying.

'Another title for Gaddafi'

Longuet said the rebels should not wait for Gaddafi's defeat, while signalling Paris's objective was still that the Libyan leader must eventually leave power.

The rebels have so far refused to hold talks as long as Gaddafi remains in power, a stance which before now none of NATO's major powers has publicly challenged.

"We have ... asked them to speak to each other," Longuet, whose government has until now been among the most hawkish on Libya, said on French television station BFM TV.

"The position of the TNC is very far from other positions. Now, there will be a need to sit around a table," he said."

Asked if it was possible to hold talks if Gaddafi had not stepped down, Longuet said: "He will be in another room in his palace with another title."

Soon after, the US state department in Washington issued a message that gave no hint of compromise.

"The Libyan people will be the ones to decide how this transition takes place, but we stand firm in our belief that Gaddafi cannot remain in power," it said in a written reply to a query.

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Al Jazeera Live Blog: Link as there are some pics not on youtube: http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya

The pizza looks good, too...I seem to recall a saying about armies marching on their stomachs

9:00pm: ‘Niz’ pro-democracy activist from with Free Generation Movement speaks with AlJazeera English on the current situation in Tripoli



8:37pm: France has denied being in direct talks with the Libyan government but admits to “passing messages” to Muammar Gaddafi’s regime.

Good morning!

Euronews:

Tunisia copes with Libyan refugees

11/07 21:01 CET

The border post of Dehiba, in the south west of Tunisia, is one of the two main crossing points for people fleeing the conflict in Libya. Every day 800 Libyans use this border point to enter or leave the country. Tunisian officials say more than 60,000 refugees have crossed the Libyan border via Dehiba between April and June. Among them is Ibrahim Issa’s family from Nalout. They have found refuge at Tataouine, 100 kilometres from here. Ibrahim said:

“I sent all my family to Tunisia in order to be safe. In Libya, I couldn’t be sure that nothing would happen to them, because the bombing was arbitrary. There are troops everywhere and you do not know where the shots are coming from.”

Three kilometres from the border at Dehiba is where we meet Mounir and his family. They fled Nalout three months ago. Since then, they have been looked after by Tunisians free of charge. The baby, a month and a half old, was born in Tunisia.

“We fled Nalout. We came to Tunisia and the people here and gave us places to stay and food to eat. They are brothers to us. Now all is well, thank God,” said Mounir.

95 per cent of Libyan refugees are hosted by Tunisians, a courtesy that Messaoud has extended to Mounir and his family:

“I came home from my work. I found them on the road, they had nowhere to go. I took them to my house. This is done in the name of God, nothing more or less.”

47 kilometres from Dehiba is the refugee camp of Remada. Prepared by the UNHCR on April 11, at the time of our visit there were 800 refugees, mostly women, children and old people. Even faced with the uncertainties raised by the conflict in Libya, camp officials are prepared, should the situation become more desperate explained camp manager Hatim Saied:

“I hope the situation will not last long. If it does, we have a long term plan and a contingency plan. If there’s a massive influx, the camp has capacity for 10,000 people or 1,500 families.”

Fatima and Mona’s families have been at the camp for two months. Fatima had to leave because of the bombing of Nalout:

“Everyone was afraid. Even if you had money, you couldn’t buy anything, not even bread, there’s nothing anywhere. We were too scared to even leave our houses.”

Now Mona is safe, but her brother is at the front with the rebels, fighting against Gaddafi. Mona remains defiant:

“We will not give up. We remain confident. Even if he kills all our people and all our children! You always have hope. We will go home, that’s for sure, and Gaddafi will leave the country.”

The refugees we spoke to are all against Gaddafi, whose soldiers, they say, have killed their cattle and burned their fields. They are looking forward to the fall of the regime, including this refugee called Mohammed:

“We have to stop Gaddafi as soon as possible. Every day there are more and more victims. They say it will be in a week, a month, and during that time, he continues to kill innocent people.”

Telegraph: Assorted reports: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/
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Posted on July 12, 2011 by admin

New York: London: Tripoli: Reuters 09:39

The U.N. peace envoy for Libya said on Monday he was urging the country’s government and rebels to turn indirect talks on a settlement into direct ones, but acknowledged the two sides were still far apart. After briefing the U.N. Security Council on a weekend visit he paid to Tripoli, Abdul Elah al-Khatib said he had told Libyan leaders a body with representatives from all political groups, regions and tribes was needed to manage a transition.

In rebel-held Libya, men find new identities as warriors
Posted on July 11, 2011

The Guardian Reporting from Kikla, Libya

He is a soft-spoken 22-year-old with a massive Belgian machine gun.

“Allahu akbar!” Radwan Othman cries out as he opens fire in response to a barrage of rockets fired by Moammar Kadafi’s troops less than two miles across the valley.

Afterward he goes silent, staring into space with glazed eyes. He doesn’t talk much, and his friends at this front-line position at the far eastern edge of rebel-controlled territory in the Nafusa Mountains worry about him.

Until the uprising against Kadafi’s 42-year rule began in February, Othman sold women’s clothes at a shop in Tripoli and had never handled a gun in his life.

“The war changes you,” said Mesbah Sassi, a 28-year-old fighter who was unemployed before the war began and is among the volunteer fighters here in Kikla. “It turns you from a nice person into an aggressive person. I was a civilian. Now I have a gun and shoot to kill, and for us it’s getting too easy.”

The GuardianThe drive to oust the longtime ruler has subsumed nearly every aspect of life in these long-sleepy mountains, a 100-mile-long rebel-controlled region of pasturelands, tiny farming villages and close-knit towns that has become the focal point of the NATO-backed effort to weaken and oust Kadafi.

War has turned shepherds into hardened volunteer fighters, bent the economy to fit battle needs, replaced long-planned weddings with somber funerals for young men.

And it has raised the question of how, or even whether, those taking part in a conflict that has lasted nearly five months and shows little sign of a quick resolution will be able to simply turn in their weapons and go back to civilian life.

Already there are signs of an emerging warrior caste, young men who have forged identities in war, and found self-respect in toting weapons and pushing people twice their age around.

The creation of such a generation can change not only the individuals but the trajectory of the country. In the most chaotic Third World examples, nations have been beset by roving groups of heavily armed men long after the conflict ends, while in other countries, such as Iran after its 1980s war with Iraq, the fighters have become today’s leaders, now pursuing an assertive and some would say belligerent security policy.

Here in the mountains of Libya, young men alternate between giddiness and horror at their new selves.

“When they ran out of ammunition, we warned them to give up. But they didn’t give up,” Hadi Mohammad, a 22-year-old fighter, said with dismay, describing a recent battle against Kadafi’s forces. “We killed so many of them.”

One of the fighters confided to his friend Madgis Abouzakher that he was becoming too enamored with the daily rhythm of war, that he was feeling too much violence inside him, that he felt he was becoming a “monster” to others.

“Everybody is worried about the front and thinking about the front,” said Abouzakher, the co-director of a cultural association in the town of Yafran. “They can’t communicate with their wives or their children. It’s an important issue. What happens after the war?”

Already, just as in eastern Libya, the fighters’ unruliness and lack of discipline have contributed to a number of battlefield debacles. But unlike eastern Libya, the Nafusa Mountains are hemmed in by Kadafi’s forces to the north, south and east. The risks are even higher for these poorly trained volunteers, who sometimes appear heedless of the danger.

“They want to do anything anytime,” said Jumaa Ibrahim, spokesman for the Zintan-based rebel command. “It’s difficult to stop.”

Mohammad, the 22-year-old at the front lines of Kikla, said all aspects of his life had been taken over by war, and even during the three or four hours of fitful sleep he has each night, he’s often startled awake by gunfire, rushing to grab his gun and hurry half-awake toward the front line.

“In this town, there’s no celebratory gunfire,” he said. “It’s not allowed. Every bullet is to be used for Kadafi’s men.”

In areas where there is relative security, such as the towns of Jadu and Qala, the rebel administration has reestablished police forces in an attempt to bring some sense of normality. “The point of getting guns is to get rid of Kadafi,” said Mohammad Abul Qassem, a 26-year-old former engineer and fighter. “After that we don’t need guns. Hopefully, the law will prevail then.

For now, men with guns rule these rustic mountains. In Zintan and Nalut, pickups mounted with antiaircraft guns stream up and down roads largely devoid of people. Children who should be in school serve tea and water to young men at military positions.

But many of the women and children have been sent to Tunisia or to safer cities, to clear the men’s minds of worry for their families as they head into battle.

“Because of this fighting and killing and shelling, a lot of the women go,” said Mokhtar Fakhal, a quiet former schoolteacher who is considered one of the elders of Zintan. “They go out of town and live in caves. They go underground.”

His son, Hisham, 25, was shot in the neck during a battle, a clean wound that didn’t hit any major arteries or nerves. He’s recovering at a clinic in neighboring Tunisia, once a medical tourism destination for Libyan plastic surgery and cancer patients and now serving as vast triage for the war-wounded flooding across the border.

“We chose this way and we will never go back,” Fakhal said. “That is life.”

A grim aesthetic has taken hold of the region. Pickups once used to haul produce to market are smeared with mud to make them blend in with the high desert landscape. Bulldozers and backhoes that once contributed to a small boom in new housing form dirt mounds at checkpoints. Unemployed cooks prepare aluminum trays, each with rice and beans and a clump of fatty mutton for fighters on the front.

Rebel commanders here predict that the war could be finished in three weeks. But the incremental nature of the rebels’ battlefield advances suggests that such a timeframe could be wishful thinking; and the rebel administration itself appears to be preparing for one that could last months. They have built training bases for young recruits in Nalut, Jadu and Zintan and are preparing another in Kikla.

Recruits stream in from across Libya, including some from the rebel stronghold, Benghazi, bored by the lack of action on the front to the east.

Bundoq Assem Bundoq, 26, came from the northwestern coastal city of Zuwara. He arrived in the mountains after a perilous journey by boat to Tunisia, spending weeks settling his family abroad before heading back to Libya. He wore a red beret as he underwent three weeks of basic training in Jadu.

He speaks near-perfect American-tinged English, picked up from countless television shows, action movies and pop music recordings. He used to play guitar, an aspiring musician who loves Pink Floyd, My Dying Bride and traditional Arab folk music.

“That part of my life,” he said, “is over for now.”

Thanks for the update LL

Al Jazeera Live Blog:

38 min 38 sec ago

Widespread discussions were being held between Tripoli and other key countries to end the crisis in Libya but there were no full-scale negotiations, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said on Tuesday.

"Everybody is in contact with everybody. The Libyan regime is sending messengers everywhere, to Turkey, New York, Paris. There are contacts but it's not a negotiation proper at this stage," Juppe said on France Info state radio.

Juppe also said: "Emissaries are telling us Gaddafi is ready to go, let's talk about it," he said, without saying who the emissaries were, and he repeated calls for Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi to step down.

45 min 38 sec ago

Gaddafi will not take part in proposed talks between the embattled regime and rebels, Prime Minister Baghdadi al-Mahmudi said in an interview published on Tuesday, the AFP reported.

"The Guide will not take part in these discussions. Everything must be open," he told France's Le Figaro newspaper, referring to Gaddafi.

"We are ready to negotiate unconditionally," he said, adding it was not for him to say "in which room... the Guide will find himself".

The comments came a day after French Defence Minister Gerard Longuet suggested that Gaddafi could remain in Tripoli "in another room in his palace" and NATO could stop its bombing campaign while talks began.

But the prime minister said a halt to the bombing was a pre-condition for any dialogue. "We simply want a stop to the bombardments so that one can talk in a serene atmosphere," he said. "We cannot talk as bombs rain down."

Feb 17 Libya News:

Posted on July 12, 2011 by S050

1:00pm: France said Muammar Gaddafi was ready to leave power, according to emissaries, the latest sign contacts were underway between the Libyan leader and NATO members to find a way out of the crisis.

“Emissaries are telling us Gaddafi is ready to go, let’s talk about it,” French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said, without revealing who the emissaries were. “The question is no longer about whether Gaddafi goes but when and how,” Juppe said.

12:30pm: New U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said on Monday that some NATO allies operating in Libya could see their forces “exhausted” within 90 days.

“The problem right now, frankly, in Libya is that … within the next 90 days a lot of these other countries could be exhausted in terms of their capabilities, and so the United States, you know, is going to be looked at to help fill the gap,” Panetta said, speaking to troops in Baghdad.

He did not say which countries he was referring to, or what the U.S. response would be to calls for help.

12:00pm: Abu Dhabi’s First Gulf Bank has severed ties with its Libyan unit after political unrest in the country and its investment has been classified as “available for sale,” a filing from the lender showed.

FGB, majority owned by Abu Dhabi’s ruling family, has suspended its management agreement with former subsidiary, First Gulf Libya Bank, adding the investment had a net carrying value of 396 million dirhams ($107.8 million).

“FGB has no involvement in the day-to-day operations of FGLB and FGLB is no longer classified as a subsidiary of FGB,” it said in a prospectus filed to the London Stock Exchange and dated July 11.

“FGB’s investment in FGLB is now classified as an available for sale investment.”

11:30am: Switzerland said Tuesday it is dispatching a diplomat to the rebel-held Libyan city of Benghazi to open an office aimed at strengthening its ties with the Libyan National Transitional Council.

“By sending a special envoy to Benghazi, Switzerland is signaling its intent to strengthen its presence there, and to intensify its political relations with the Libyan National Transitional Council,” said the Swiss Foreign Ministry.

“The special envoy is entrusted with the task of safeguarding Switzerland’s interests in Benghazi, promoting and intensifying contact with the NTC, and with opening a liaison office,” it added.

Switzerland stressed that the NTC is its “sole legitimate partner for contact” before strife-hit Libya is able to elect a government.

Swiss President Micheline Calmy-Rey had met a member of the rebel leadership in Bern as early as 9 March, just four days after the NTC was set up. The Swiss embassy in Tripoli has been closed since 27 February due to security reasons, said the ministry.

The end is in sight if Switzerland knows where the future money is going to be...

Good morning:

Al Jazeera Live Blog:

13 hours 4 min ago



French parliamentarians voted overwhelmingly to extend funding for the country's military intervention in Libya. Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland reports from Paris:

13 hours 11 min ago

Two French military aircraft taking part in NATO-led operations against the Gaddafi regime had to make emergency landings in Malta on Tuesday, civil aviation authorities told the AFP.

A tyre on one of the planes burst as it touched down on the runway with emergency service vehicles standing by. Sources said the planes were armed. The other had failed to refuel while in flight, the sources said.

13 hours 13 min ago

Libya could face a shortage of food because a lack of fuel has prevented it from bringing in most of this season's grain harvest, Muammar Gaddafi's agriculture minister, Abdul Almajeed Elgowood, said.

It is harvest time and we just harvested 20 per cent (of the crop) because we do not have means of transport because of the fuel shortage ... We used to import 1 million tonnes (of grain) per year, but with the embargo and United Nations bureaucracy we are afraid that we could face a shortage.

15 hours 45 min ago

France's lower house of parliament has voted to extend military operations in Libya, keeping French forces in a wider NATO effort to protect civilians and support a rebellion against Muammar Gaddafi.

The National Assembly voted overwhelmingly to grant further funding for the military operation nearly four months after French planes started bombing troops loyal to Gaddafi in eastern Libya, with 482 deputies voting in favour and 27 against.

17 hours 37 min ago

French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said "A political solution [in Libya] is more than ever indispensable and is beginning to take shape."

Fillion was speaking to a parliamentary commission, which is expected to vote later in the day on whether to extend operations in Libya.

17 hours 39 min ago

Fighters in the Sahara desert have exploited the chaos in Libya to acquire weapons from the north African country, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said on Tuesday.

"Extremists in the Sahel region have taken advantage of the conflict in Libya to get arms," Frattini told a media conference during a visit to Algeria.

Algerian officials have previously warned that al Qaeda's north African branch is smuggling weapons out of Libya to its base in the Sahara.

France's lower house of parliament has voted to extend military operations in Libya, keeping French forces in a wider NATO effort to protect civilians and support a rebellion against Muammar Gaddafi.


Hopefully that will help concentrate minds in the Gaddafi camp, LL.