Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi said on Saturday he was ready for a ceasefire and negotiations provided NATO “stop its planes”, but he refused to give up power as rebels and Western powers demand.
The rebels and NATO rejected Gaddafi’s offer, saying it lacked credibility. A spokesman for the insurgents said the time for compromise had passed and NATO said air strikes would go on as long as Libyan civilians were being threatened. Weeks of Western air strikes have failed to dislodge the Libyan leader, instead imposing a stalemate on a war Gaddafi looked to have been winning, with government forces held at bay in the east and around the besieged city of Misrata while fighting for control of the western mountains.
With neither side apparently able to gain the upper hand, Gaddafi struck a more conciliatory tone in an 80-minute televised address to the nation in the early hours of Saturday. “(Libya) is ready until now to enter a ceasefire,” said Gaddafi, speaking from behind a desk and aided by reams of paper covered in what appeared to be hand-written notes. “We were the first to welcome a ceasefire and we were the first to accept a ceasefire … but the Crusader NATO attack has not stopped,” he said. “The gate to peace is open.” Gaddafi denied mass attacks on civilians and challenged NATO to find him 1,000 people who had been killed in the conflict, kindled by pro-democracy uprisings elsewhere in the Arab world.
“We did not attack them or cross the sea … why are they attacking us?” asked Gaddafi, referring to European countries involved in the air strikes. “Let us negotiate with you, the countries that attack us. Let us negotiate.” But as he spoke, NATO warplanes hit three targets close to the television building in Tripoli in what state media said was an attempt to kill Gaddafi who has ruled since a 1969 coup. The air strikes left a large crater outside the attorney general’s office but did not damage the building, and hit two other government offices housed in colonial-era buildings. It was not immediately clear if there were any casualties. The rebels’ transitional national council dismissed Gaddafi’s gesture, saying the Libyan leader had repeatedly offered ceasefires only to continue violating human rights.
‘LOST CREDIBILITY’: “Gaddafi’s regime has lost all credibility,” council spokesman Abdel Hafiz Ghoga said in a statement.
“The time for compromise has passed. The people of Libya cannot possibly envisage or accept a future Libya in which cannot Gaddafi’s regime plays any role.” The rebel military spokesman, Colonel Ahmed Bani, said Gaddafi was “playing dirty games” … He doesn’t speak honestly. We don’t believe him and we don’t trust him”. In Brussels, a NATO official told Reuters that Libyan authorities had announced ceasefires several times before only to continue attacks on cities and civilians.
