UQAYLA, Libya, March 12, (Agencies): Libyan rebel fighters beat a retreat from positions near the oil town of Ras Lanuf under air strikes and shellfire Saturday, as Muammar Gaddafi’s loyalist forces forged forward. Having abandoned an attempt to recapture Ras Lanuf, anti-regime fighters struggled to set up a new defensive line 30 kms (13 miles) further east along a coastal road towards Brega, outside the village of Uqayla. There, at the final rebel checkpoint before the front, some 70 armed volunteers from eastern Libya milled around, scattering when government war planes roared overhead and listening to shells exploding further west. The volunteers explained that one unit of former regular army troops, now fighting part of the rebellion, was still in action a little further west, under shellfire, but that the lightly armed guerrillas had fallen back. “This morning we were there, 30 kilometres from here, but we had to withdraw because of the bombs,” 40-year-old Wanis Muftar, a volunteer in camouflage fatigues and toting a Kalashnikov assault rifle, told AFP.

“Inshallah, we’re going to try to send people to counterattack.” Tarek, a 32-year-old rebel who came down from the anti-Gaddafi revolution’s capital in Libya’s second city Benghazi agreed, confirming the fighters had had no choice but to retreat but promising they would respond. The month-old revolt against Gaddafi’s 42-year reign captured Ras Lanuf, a small town and oil refinery on Libya’s Mediterranean coast just over a week ago, only to lose it again in a regime onslaught on Thursday. Now, the rebels seem to be mounting a fighting retreat back down the coast road to Brega, the last main town before Ajdabiya, gateway to eastern Libya on the roads to the main rebel cities of Benghazi and Tobruk. Earlier, the Uqayla checkpoint had been targeted by two airstrikes. An AFP journalist at the scene saw more than a dozen rebel pick-ups and cars racing away from the front, back towards Brega, 40 kms to the east. Three wounded fighters were taken to Brega hospital for treatment, including a rebel hit by shrapnel, Dr Yussef al-Badri said there. At an emergency meeting on Saturday from which Libya was excluded, the Arab League came out in support of Western plans to impose a no-fly zone which would seek to prevent Gaddafi’s forces from striking rebels from the air, diplomats said.

No-fly zone
Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa has called on importance of imposing a no-fly zone over troubled Libya, where government and opposition forces are in clashes killing and wounding hundreds of people. Moussa, in an interview with the German Der Spiegel maagzine in its Monday edition, said the popular uprisings in the Arab countries “cannot be stopped. “I see the Arab countries falling towards democracy like the dominos,” said Moussa. The Arab League chief said he supported the international intervention in Libya to stop the bloodshed. “I am talking about operations with humanitarian nature ... The objective of the no-fly zone is to provide assistance for the Libyan people and stand by them in their struggle for freedom and against a tyrant regime,” he said. Moussa said the Arab League could have a role in the no-fly zone, but the final decision should be taken by the UN Security Council. Moussa said Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi “lacks the method in which former Tunisian and Egyptian Presidents adopted “when they announce resignations from their posts” in the wake of revolutions by their people.

Egyptian officials say two US vessels have crossed the Suez Canal en route to the Mediterranean Sea to be close to Libya. The nuclear-powered submarine USS Providence and Destroyer USS Mason entered the canal Saturday from the Red Sea. The officials said the warships are part of the American carrier battle group led by the USS Enterprise. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media. US military officials have ordered warships into the Mediterranean in case they are needed for Libya-related operations ranging from humanitarian assistance to possible military action. There are at least five major US warships in the Mediterranean, including the USS Kearsarge with a contingent of US Marines on board.

The US Treasury Department, moving to add pressure on Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, said on Friday it had extended asset-freeze sanctions to his wife, four of his sons and four senior officials in his government. The Treasury said it added Gaddafi’s wife, Safia Farkash, and four children, three of whom hold senior military and state company positions, to its blacklist under two-week-old sanctions against Gaddafi’s regime.
The action bans US persons from conducting transactions with them and seeks to freeze assets that they may have under US jurisdiction.
Also blacklisted were Libya’s Minister of Defense, Abu Bakr Yunis Jabir, and its director of military intelligence, Abdullah Al-Senussi, as well as the director of its External Security Organization and the head of its public works committee.

In addition to aiding the Gaddafi regime’s attacks on Libyan protesters, the Treasury accused Al-Senussi of organizing mass killings in Benghazi and recruiting foreign mercenaries fighting on Gaddafi’s behalf.
The moves bring the total amount of assets sought to be frozen by the US sanctions to more than $32 billion, the Treasury said.
“Today’s designation should send a strong signal to those responsible for the violence inflicted by Gaddafi and his government that the United States will continue steps to increase pressure and to hold them accountable,” according to a statement from David Cohen, Treasury’s acting under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
Gaddafi’s sons who were blacklisted are Hannibal Gaddafi, who heads the General Maritime Transport Co of Libya; Saadi Gaddafi, Commander of Special Forces and head of the Libyan Football Federation; Muhammad Gaddafi, chairman of the General Post and Telecommunications Co and head of the country’s Olympic committee, and Saif al-Arab Gaddafi.

Yemen
Four protesters including a 12-year-old schoolboy were killed in fresh bloodshed in Yemen on Saturday, as clashes between police and anti-regime demonstrators raged across the country.
Security forces in the impoverished country, a key US ally in the war against Al-Qaeda, fired bullets and tear gas at demonstrators camping at University Square, killing one and wounding many more, protest organisers said.
A sniper shot dead another man as he walked with a group of demonstrators to the square, an opposition party member said.
Police shot dead the schoolboy in the southeastern city of Mukalla as they tried to disperse a student demonstration, witnesses and medics said.

And another protester was later killed as police opened fire to disperse a demonstration in the southern port city of Aden, where several anti-regime marches were held, medical and security sources said.
“Five demonstrators were wounded by police gunfire and one of them has died of his injuries,” said an official at the city’s Dorrat al-Dar hospital.
The violence comes a day after 14 protesters were wounded in protests across the country, which is already battling secessionist unrest, a Shiite sectarian rebellion and jihadists from al-Qaeda’s Arabian Peninsula offshoot.

More than 30 protesters were shot with live rounds in Sanaa’s University Square, and hundreds more suffered injuries including loss of consciousness and spasms from breathing gases, medics said.
The dawn assault targeted demonstrators who had breached a concrete police barrier at the square, where activists have been staging a sit-in for almost three weeks to demand the ouster of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Saleh has insisted he will see out his term until 2013 while offering to devolve power to parliament after a referendum on a new constitution this year.
The United States has applauded the offer, with US President Barack Obama’s top anti-terror advisor, John Brennan, on Friday calling on the Yemeni opposition to “respond constructively,” according to a White House statement.

Opposition groups had already dismissed the promise of constitutional change and have vowed to escalate protests until Saleh, in power since 1978, resigns.
Parts of Sanaa resembled a battleground as people passed out in the street and convulsed after inhaling gas fired at the demonstrators.
“This isn’t tear gas. This is poison gas that disables the nervous and respiratory systems. People hit by this gas pass out,” said Iraqi doctor Hussein al-Joshaai, a nerve specialist who was at the scene.
Another doctor, Abdulwahab al-Inssi, said: “Those wounded today couldn’t have been hit by tear gas grenades. They are suffering spasms.”

The interior ministry denied the allegations as “baseless slander.”
It accused protesters of opening fire at security forces who had tried to prevent clashes between demonstrators and residents near the square. It said 161 police were injured.
Street battles raged all morning as security forces blocked roads to the square and prevented ambulances from evacuating casualties, protest organisers said.
A security official said police were not planning to storm the sit-in, only “return the demonstration to its size of yesterday because the expansion of the sit-in has disturbed residents.”
US ambassador Gerald M. Feierstein described Saturday’s clashes as “dangerous.”
“As the tension grows, as the positions of the two sides harden, the possibility for conflict grows. We consider this to be dangerous, we consider this not to be in the interest of the Yemeni people,” he told journalists.

Saudis
Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Friday called the protests in the oil giant a “tempest in a teacup,” saying instead of it being a “day of rage” people were demonstrating their love for the king.
A day after police fired on marchers to break up a demonstration in the eastern city of Al-Qateef, Alwaleed told the US CNBC television that the country was nothing like Libya or Egypt, and the government had strong support of its people.
Alwaleed said nobody showed up after midday prayers in Riyadh Friday for a “day of rage” demonstration calling for democracy and rights called for in an anonymously-launched Internet campaign.
With a heavy police presence on the streets of the Saudi capital, “I didn’t find a single human being there after the prayer,” he said.
“In a nutshell, this whole thing was a tempest in a teacup.”

“You should call it day of allegiance, of love for the King Abdullah,” said Alwaleed, a nephew of the king and an investment tycoon with a fortune pegged at $20 billion.
“Today in the street, people had their flags up, they were just embracing themselves, and they were saying we will not tolerate and accept any demonstrations here.”
According to other reports, rights activists stayed home Friday after police boosted patrols and monitoring in Riyadh and Jeddah.
But scores of protestors were on the streets for a second day in Al-Qateef, a Shiite stronghold in the predominantly Sunni country.
On Thursday an estimated 700-800 Shiite protestors marched in the city to call for the release of arrested activists and for the government to stop repressing their religious practice.
Three people were injured in a confrontation in which police fired bullets — according to some reports, rubber bullets — and stun grenades at the crowd.

But Alwaleed dismissed it as a small misunderstanding involving “40-50 people.”
“Authorities talked to them, and dispersed them amicably ...This was not a demonstration,” he said.
Alwaleed, who was ranked number 26 on the Forbes list of billionaires this week with a fortune put at $19.6 billion, is the largest single shareholder in Citigroup and controls stakes in large groups like Apple and Newscorp through his tightly-held Kingdom Holdings group.
He is also a confidant of the king — the half brother of Alwaleed’s father — and, in the context of the kingdom’s ultrastrict Islamic laws and traditions, a social progressive.
He said the king is moving to address some of the country’s problems, but did not mention political reform of the absolute monarchy.
“Sure enough, we would like to make many changes internally,” he said.
“King Abdullah is a reformer... it’s an ongoing process. Each country has to advance and go at its own speed.
“Saudi Arabia is no Egypt, and no Libya, and no Tunisia, period.”

Egypt
The Egyptian police have arrested two members of Hosni Mubarak’s National Democratic (NDP) Party accused of organising violence against demonstrators during the uprising that swept him from the presidency.
The two NDP figures, both members of the now dissolved parliament, were arrested on suspicion of involvement in “bloody Wednesday”, the state news agency reported.
It was referring to the events of Feb 2 when Mubarak loyalists mounted on camels and horses charged protesters, triggering a battle that was seen as a crucial moment in the 18-day uprising against the president.
The agency named the two as Abdel Nasser al-Jabari, a member of the lower house of parliament, and Youssef Khattab, a member of the upper chamber.
The camel and horse charge was part of an offensive by Mubarak supporters trying to dislodge protesters from Cairo’s Tahrir Square. The protesters defended their position and public disgust at the incident galvanised more opposition to Mubarak.
The public prosecutor has also ordered the arrest of four former senior Interior Ministry officials on suspicion of conspiracy to murder by ordering the killing of protesters.

Tunisia
Two of ousted Tunisian leader Zine El Abidine Ben Ali’s top lieutenants and a former president of parliament have been arrested and are being held in military detention, judicial sources said Saturday.
Ben Ali’s former advisor Abdel Aziz Ben Dhia and Abdel Wahab Abdallah, who served as minister in the presidency, were arrested on Thursday along with former Senate chief Abdallah Kallal and taken to a military base near Tunis.
The men had been under effective house arrest since Jan 23 but their detention in the Aouina base follows a criminal investigation by public prosescutors.
“They are being investigated for different corruption cases,” said one of the sources, who refused to give further details.
Ben Dhia was regarded as one of the chief architects of Ben Ali’s 23-year regime, which ended on Jan 14 when the president fled to Saudi Arabia following a wave of mass protests, while Wahab Abdallah was one of its main mouthpieces.
Kallal, who also served as interior minister, resigned as head of the Tunisian parliament two days after Ben Ali’s resignation.
Several other close associates and relatives of Ben Ali are also being held at the same base, according to the same sources.