Deposed strongman Muammar Gaddafi called on Libyans to turn out in their millions to demonstrate against the country’s new rulers, as his forces launched a counter-attack in his besieged hometown Sirte. Gaddafi’s plea, made in a poor quality audio message broadcast late Thursday on Syria-based Arrai television, came as US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta was holding talks in Naples with NATO officers on the future of the Libyan air war.
“I call on the Libyan people, men and women, to go out into the squares and the streets and in all the cities in their millions” to reject the National Transitional Council, the deposed leader said. “I say to them, do not fear anyone. You are the people, you belong to this land,” said Gaddafi, whose whereabouts are unknown but is widely thought to still be in Libya.
“Make your voice heard against NATO’s collaborators,” he said, in reference to the new regime of the National Transitional Council. His message came as fighting raged in Sirte, his hometown on the Mediterranean coast, where his loyalists tried to break a three-week siege of the city by NTC fighters.
Sirte and Bani Walid, a desert town 170 kilometres southeast of of Tripoli, are Gaddafi’s last major bastions against the NTC, which has ruled most of the oil-rich country since the veteran strongman was toppled in August. By the middle of the day, NTC fighters had halted the pro-Gaddafi assault and were advancing on foot among the buildings, in the face of rocket and sniper fire.
Meanwhile, NTC reinforcements were being sent to Bani Walid for another assault of Gaddafi’s loyalists who are fiercely defending the oasis. Yunes said efforts were being made to convince the remaining 10 percent of the population still there to leave before the new assault is launched after a month-long siege.
“The offensive could, possibly, be launched in two days, but that depends” on the situation, he added, explaining that the NTC forces were outgunned.
“There are many weapons in Bani Walid, weapons of high technology, very recent, coming from Russia,” he said.
Seif al-Islam, his father and Gaddafi’s intelligence chief Abdullah al-Senussi are the subject of International Criminal Court war crimes arrest warrants for murder and persecution in the bloody uprising. Amid complaints that NATO air strikes had destroyed homes and killed residents in Sirte, Panetta flew to the allied command in Naples to confer with officers overseeing the air war.
The Pentagon chief told a news conference that NATO allies were weighing when to halt the bombing campaign and that it would depend in part on the strength of local forces on the ground, who have encircled Gaddafi’s loyalists.
He said NATO defence ministers reached a consensus on the conditions for ending the six-month Libya air war, vowing to keep bombing until Gaddafi forces stop attacking civilians and the new leadership can ensure security across the country.
NATO Supreme Allied Commander in Europe, US Admiral James Stavridis, recommended to the defence ministers late Wednesday that the mission continue until the new leadership consolidates control of the entire country, diplomats said.
