TARHOUNA, Libya, Sept 4, (Agencies): Negotiations over the surrender of one of Muammar Gaddafi’s remaining strongholds have collapsed, and Libyan rebels were waiting for the green light to launch their final attack on the besieged town of Bani Walid, a spokesman said.
Rebel negotiator Abdullah Kanshil said the talks had broken down after Moussa Ibrahim, Gaddafi’s chief spokesman and a top aide, had insisted the rebels put down their weapons before entering the town of Bani Walid, some 90 miles (140 kms) southeast of Tripoli.
Rebel forces control most of the oil-rich North African nation and are already setting up a new government, but Gaddafi and his staunchest allies remain on the run and enjoy support in several central and southern areas, including Bani Walid and the fugitive leader’s hometown of Sirte.
The rebels have said the hard-core loyalists are a small minority inside the town, but are heavily armed and stoking fear to keep other residents from surrendering.
“We feel sorry for the people of Bani Walid,” said Kanshil, himself a native of Bani Walid, speaking to reporters at a rebel checkpoint about 40 miles (70 kms) north of the besieged town. “We hope for the best for our town.”
The rebels have extended to Saturday a deadline for the surrender of Gaddafi’s hometown of Sirte and other loyalist areas but some have warned they could attack Bani Walid sooner because many of the most prominent former regime officials were believed to be inside.
There has been speculation that Gaddafi himself along with his son Seif al-Islam had been there at some point, and the apparent presence of Ibrahim indicates that the town was a haven for high-level Gaddafi aides.
“This battle has already been decided,” said Ahmed Bani, the rebels’ military spokesman based in Benghazi. “It is only a matter of hours.”
He said there had been clashes around the town for the last four days and rebel forces had come under fire from rockets and machine guns.
Thousands of rebel fighters have converged on Bani Walid in recent days from multiple directions.
The rebels say Gaddafi does have some genuine supporters in Bani Walid, mainly people linked to the dictator through an elaborate patronage system that helped keep him in power for nearly 42 years.
Gaddafi supporters are “claiming that (rebel) fighters will come and rape their women,” said Mubarak al-Saleh, the representative from Bani Walid to the rebels’ transitional council. “We are trying to assure people that the fighters are true Muslims who will not harm anybody except those whose hands are stained with blood.”
Rebels arriving from Misrata, a western port that played a central role in the war, reported late Saturday they faced no resistance when they took two military camps on the outskirts of Bani Walid.
“Negotiations are over, and we are waiting for orders” to attack, said Mohammed al-Fassi, a rebel commander at a staging area about 45 miles (70 kms) from Bani Walid. “We wanted to do this without bloodshed, but they took advantage of our timeline to protect themselves.”
Al-Fassi said more Gaddafi loyalists have moved into Bani Walid from the south outlined by a line of high hills, but did not know how many.
NATO, meanwhile, reported bombing a military barracks, a police camp and several other targets near the southern stronghold of Sirte overnight, as well as targets near Hun, a possible staging ground in the desert halfway between Sirte and Sabha. It also reported bombing an ammunition storage facility near Bani Walid. Sirte is Gaddafi’s hometown.
NATO has been bombing Gaddafi’s forces since March under a United Nations mandate to protect Libyan civilians. But that mandate expires on Sept 27, and the rebels may be anxious to end the fight before it runs out — since it may be politically difficult to get it renewed.
While it is now held by loyalists, Bani Walid also has a history of opposition to Gaddafi. Western diplomats in Libya and opposition leaders abroad reported in 1993 that the air force had put down an uprising by army units in Misrata and Bani Walid. They said many officers were executed and arrested.
Fayez Jibril, a longtime Libyan opposition figure speaking from exile in Cairo, said Gaddafi tried to exploit tribal differences by giving privileges to some groups, like the Warfala and Gaddafi’s own Gadhdadhfa, and sidelining others. But Jibril said Libyans had united in the past against colonial rule, and he believed they would do so against Gaddafi.
Jibril, who has close contacts with rebel commanders on the ground in Libya, said in a number of top Gaddafi officials had sought haven in Sirte and Sabha, two other loyalist bastions. The officials are accused of abuses, including rapes, in the regime’s crackdown against the rebellion, Jibril said.
“The crimes these people have committed are unforgivable in a conservative country like Libya,” he said. “These people are dead and they know that they are dead, so they are fighting because they have no other option.”
The rebel military spokesman added that residents have told the rebels that one of Gaddafi’s sons, Seif al-Islam, had fled to Bani Walid soon after Tripoli fell, but left recently for fear townspeople would hand him over to the rebels.
Many have speculated that the elder Gaddafi is hiding somewhere around Sirte, Bani Walid or the loyalist town of Sabha, deep in the Libyan desert. He and Seif al-Islam have tried to rally supporters in defiant audio recordings broadcast on the Syrian-based Al-Rai television station but no concrete information about their whereabouts has emerged.
Outside Sirte, Mustafa al-Rubaie, a rebel commander who was part of the talks with Sirte tribal leaders, said rebels have been stationed about 60 miles (95 kms) outside of Sirte, but have occasionally clashed with Gaddafi supporters over the past days.
The rebels want the local tribal chiefs to hand over “officers and soldiers who committed crimes and raped women,” he said.

Family
Algeria’s prime minister defended on Sunday his country’s decision to shelter members of Gaddafi’s family, describing it as a humanitarian case.
The ousted Libyan leader’s wife Safia, daughter Aisha and sons Mohammed and Hannibal entered Algeria on Aug 29 after the Libyan leader was ousted from power in a six-month rebellion. Aisha gave birth to a girl hours after crossing the border.
Libya’s interim rulers have criticised Algeria’s decision to shelter Gaddafi’s family as an “act of aggression”.
“They are Algeria’s responsibility,” Prime Minister Ahmed Ouyahia said of the Gaddafi family members in Algeria, describing the case as humanitarian.
“The Libyans themselves ... asked us to consider them as Algerians,” he added, without specifying which Libyans had made such a request.
Defending the decision to offer refuge to Gaddafi’s family, he said members of toppled Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s family had been taken in by other countries. When Saudi Arabia took in ousted Tunisian leader Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali earlier this year, that move did not create “such a storm”, he said.
Algeria is the only one of Libya’s North African neighbours yet to recognise the National Transitional Council, whose fighters have taken control of the capital Tripoli and much of the rest of the country, as Libya’s new government.
Algeria will recognise Libya’s new leaders when they establish a representative government, its foreign minister said in an interview this week.
Algeria’s opposition Rally for Culture and Democracy (RCD) meanwhile gave its support to Libya’s interim government Sunday in a letter to the National Transitional Council (NTC).
“As Algerian patriots fight for the democratic advancement of their country, we reiterate our complete solidarity,” the RCD wrote.
The party, which holds 19 seats in the National Assembly, said that Libyans were en route to dealing with two issues still facing Algerians: “bringing down a military dictatorship and getting former regime officials to assume their historic duty.”
But the party warned the NTC against “the pitfalls that can meet a revolution following an archaic political order that gave itself the time and means to destructure and co-opt society.”
Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika committed to political reform in April as unrest spread across parts of the population in the wake of the uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and elsewhere.
Senate president Abdelkader Bensalah led the consultations which were largely boycotted by the opposition, including the RCD.
Bills advocating reforms will be submitted to parliament later this month.

Tuareg
Libya’s Tuareg community is facing increasing violence at the hands of the new regime and must be allowed to cross into Algeria, a Tuareg representative told media Sunday.
“The situation is catastrophic, the Tuaregs in Libya are suffering, hunted by the rebels who believe they are pro-Gaddafi,” Ishak Ag Hassini said in an interview with Algerian daily El Khabar.
“Some Tuaregs supported Gaddafi, but not all.”
Algeria closed its border with Libya after members of Moamer Gaddafi’s family took refuge, according to media reports.
As well as calling for the frontier to be opened, Ag Hassini called for help from the United Nations and humanitarian groups.
He said some Tuaregs had refused to give up their arms only for fear of being killed and urged the National Transitional Council to address the problem.
Amnesty International expressed its concern this week for the situation of those suspected of having fought with loyalist forces.

Powers
The BRICS group of emerging powers are unhappy with developments in war-torn Libya where many civilians have been killed, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Sunday.
“Unfortunately, what is happening in Libya cannot satisfy us,” he told a joint press conference with his Brazilian counterpart in Moscow carried by Russian television.
He was speaking on behalf of the BRICS — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
“The main objective as mandated by the UN Security Council is to defend the civilian population but they are dying in large numbers,” Lavrov said, adding that he saw no end to “this sad situation”.
Thursday, Russia finally joined key Western countries in recognising as the legitimate government of Libya the insurgency that toppled Gaddafi, a Moscow ally.
Moscow and China had abstained during the March vote in the Security Council that authorised the NATO air campaign in Libya.
But Russia later vehemently denounced the way the operation was conducted while calling for the departure of Gaddafi.

Police
Libya’s interim government, keen to reassure its anxious fighters and restore stability, announced plans on Sunday to draft thousands of the men who ousted Gaddafi into the police and find other jobs for the rest.
Though Tripoli has become noticeably calmer in recent days, with people returning to work, cars back on the roads and cafes and restaurants reopening, many armed men still roam the streets. Many more remain in brigades elsewhere in Libya.
National Transitional Council (NTC) officials unveiled plans to train 3,000 fighters as police and national security officers and to set up training schemes and scholarships for others.
The NTC, eager to encourage national reconciliation, said the scheme would also be open to those who fought for Gaddafi.
“They are coming from a hot environment,” Faraje Sayeh, interim minister for capacity building, told Reuters. “Now we will calm them down and try and find ways to reintegrate them into civil society.”
Sayeh said the NTC was also telling fighters to contain their expectations. “Due to six months of conflict, the potential of the government is limited. Try to bear with us.”
Many young fighters say they joined the revolt against Gaddafi because they had no jobs and resented seeing Libya’s oil wealth benefiting a small elite around the deposed leader.

Spy
German intelligence services cooperated with the spy network of Gaddafi, a former top official said Sunday, after documents emerged appearing to show links between the CIA, MI6 and Libya.
Bernd Schmidbauer, coordinator of Germany’s secret services between 1991 and 1998, told the Bild am Sonntag weekly: “It revolved mainly around information about the fight against terrorism and therefore Germany’s security interests.”
“The Libyan security service had access to sources that the Germans did not have. Thanks to these sources, we were able to defend ourselves against terrorist threats to our country,” added Schmidbauer.
However, he stressed that Germany did not carry out joint operations with the Libyan spies, as the British and American intelligence services appear to have done. “We did not cross this line,” he said.
Germany’s current government declined to say whether this cooperation had continued in recent years.
“As in all affairs relating to intelligence, we do not comment,” a government spokesman told AFP.
Files unearthed from Gaddafi’s intelligence archives and seen by AFP appear to document deep cooperation between the CIA, MI6 and the former Libyan regime, including the shipping of terror suspects for interrogation.

Maids
Philippine authorities said Sunday they have made contact with four Filipina maids employed by Gaddafi’s family, who went missing amid the chaos of the rebellion.
A special Philippine envoy to Libya, Undersecretary Rafael Seguis, was able to speak to one of the four maids, the foreign department said in a statement.
“The (women) said they are safe and secure where they are now but signified their desire to leave their employ and come back home as soon as possible,” it said, without elaborating.
It added that the Philippine embassy in Libya will assist in the “safe release” of the four women, whose location was not stated.
A diplomatic source told AFP that releasing further details on the four could jeopardise their safety.
Last week, Vice-President Jejomar Binay, who also acts as a special adviser on Filipino overseas workers, reported that the four were missing and had made a tearful call to a relative at home for help in getting out of Libya.
In March, the Philippines said it received reports that four Filipina maids working for a relative of Gaddafi were asking to be allowed to go home, but their employer had refused.
The four were initially employed at a Gaddafi family house in Tripoli, but were later transferred to Sirte, the deposed dictator’s hometown in mid-March, the foreign department said at the time.
The department could not say if the four maids were the same ones reportedly trapped in March.
As of late August, around 1,600 Filipinos were still believed to be in Libya, many of them nurses treating casualties of the months-long uprising against Gaddafi.
About nine million Filipinos work around the world, earning more money in a wide range of skilled and unskilled sectors abroad than they could in their impoverished homeland.

Syria
Syria saw a wave of violence and arrests Sunday as the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross visited Damascus to address issues including caring for the wounded and access to detainees during the government’s crackdown on a 5-month-old uprising.
Activists reported military operations and sweeping arrests in flash point areas including Idlib near the Turkish border and the eastern city of Deir el-Zour. There were reports of deaths, but numbers were unclear.
The state-run news agency reported that nine people were killed in central Syria in an ambush by armed groups in central Syria. The report, which could not be confirmed, said the victims were six soldiers and three civilians.
Syria has banned foreign journalists and restricted local media, making it difficult to independently verify reports. The regime blames the unrest on thugs and armed gangs and claims security forces are the real victims.
The UN estimates some 2,200 people have been killed since March as protesters take to the streets every week, despite the near-certainty that they will face a barrage of bullets and sniper fire by security forces. The regime is in no imminent danger of collapse, leading to concerns violence will escalate in coming weeks and months.
ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger met with Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem on Sunday and was scheduled to meet President Bashar Assad on Monday.
The government crackdown on dissent has drawn international criticism and sanctions. The European Union announced Friday it was banning oil imports from Syria, which will cost the embattled regime millions of dollars each day.
While Assad brushed off earlier condemnation as foreign meddling, the oil embargo is significant because Damascus gets about 28 percent of its revenue from the oil trade and sells fuel to France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. Some analysts believe Syria is getting financial assistance from Iran, which would cushion the EU blow.
The United States has hit more than 30 Syrian officials, including Assad himself, with economic sanctions, banned any US import of Syrian oil or petroleum products, and frozen all Syrian government assets subject to American jurisdiction. But the US has isolated Syria for decades and has little leverage with the regime.
On Sunday, a state-run newspaper in Syria criticized Europe’s move.
“Instead of playing an effective and positive political role, Europe shows its pent-up desire to evoke the colonial past,” Al-Thawra newspaper said.
At least 24 people were killed in violence across Syria on Sunday, reports said.
As more bloodletting gripped the country, Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi said Syria has agreed to host him for a visit, to help push for a peaceful outcome to the crisis.
But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned that the five-nation BRICS group of emerging powers, who have criticised Western sanctions on Syria, are determined not to allow a Libyan-style solution in that country.
Activists said security forces cracking down on democracy protesters killed 12 people on Sunday during operations in northwestern and central Syria, including a woman.
The state news agency SANA also gave a toll of 12 dead — including six troops — when an “armed terrorist group” ambushed a bus in central Syria.
Omar Idlibi, spokesman of the Local Coordination Committees (LCC) which groups anti-regime activists on the ground, said “four martyrs fell in Karnaz near the (central) town of Maharda.”
He also reported eight others people killed in the northwestern Idlib province, including two people in the town of Khan Sheikhwan.
On Friday, SANA reported that gunmen in Khan Sheikhwan had kidnapped a corporal with Syria’s internal security services, Wael Ali.
According to the LCC, security forces backed by soldiers raided Khan Sheikhwan and encircled hospitals “to prevent the wounded from being brought in for treatment.”
Last Sunday nine people were killed by heavy machine-gun fire in the town when three tanks and three security vehicles stormed it, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights advocacy group reported.
Meanwhile SANA quoted a military source saying six troops, including an officer, and three civilians were killed in Maharda on Sunday when gunmen fired on a bus “carrying soldiers and labourers going to work”.
Three assailants were also killed in a shootout with troops, while 17 people were wounded in the attack, SANA said.
The protest hub of Homs also witnessed violence Sunday as 15 people were wounded when troops and security forces raked gunfire in the central city as part of an operation launched Saturday night, the Observatory said.
The unrest came as International Committee of the Red Cross chief Jakob Kellenberger met Foreign Minister Walid Muallem for a briefing on Syria’s efforts to “restore order” and introduce reforms, blaming “armed groups” for the unrest, SANA said.
Kellenberger’s office had said he was expected to meet President Bashar al-Assad to discuss access to prisoners and areas of unrest. The ICRC chief arrived on Saturday and was due to leave on Monday afternoon.
His office said that during a previous visit in June “an understanding was reached” for “enhanced access to areas of unrest, and negotiations would take place concerning ICRC visits to detainees”.
More than 2,200 people have been killed in Syria since almost daily protests began on March 15, according to the United Nations, while human rights groups say more than 10,000 people are behind bars.
Meanwhile the Arab League secretary general Arabi said Syrian authorities now agreed to a visit, which he had announced a week ago after the 22-member group had met to discuss the Syrian crisis.
“I will express Arab concerns and I will listen,” Arabi said.
Arab foreign ministers had urged Syria “to follow the way of reason before it is too late” and halt the violence — drawing rebuke from Damascus.
In Moscow, the foreign minister insisted Russia and its partners in the BRICS group of emerging countries — Brazil, India, China and South Africa — are opposed to any foreign military intervention in Syria.
“We are proposing that the UN Security Council firmly demands that all parties to the conflict respect human rights and begin talks,” Lavrov said.
Moscow has consistently opposed sanctions against Syria and, like China, boycotted a UN Security Council meeting on sanctions against Damascus.
On Friday, the European Union imposed an embargo on oil exports, and slapped other sanction on Syria, drawing criticism from Russia. The oil embargo went into effect on Saturday.
Yemen
Hundreds of thousands of protesters demanding President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s ouster marched on Sunday in the Yemeni capital, raising tensions as troops deployed to try to prevent mass protests.
Security forces closed off all access routes to the capital from Saturday afternoon while armed civilians loyal to the veteran president also took to Sanaa’s streets, an AFP correspondent said.
“The people want to march on the (presidential) palace,” demonstrators chanted.
But in an apparent bid to avoid a confrontation with Saleh loyalists, demonstrators marched in a part of northern Sanaa that is guarded by an armoured division led by a general who has defected to the opposition.
The marchers started off from University Square — now dubbed Change Square by protesters — sticking to nearby streets and within the area controlled by the general’s troops.
But a small group of demonstrators clashed with Saleh loyalists after they split off from the main procession and headed to Asser Roundabout close to government departments.
Four protesters were wounded, including two by gunfire, organisers said.
Sanaa has been left without electricity since Saturday afternoon, and most petrol stations in the capital have turned off the taps, semi-paralysing the capital.
The massive deployment by troops loyal to Saleh followed an opposition call to step up protests against his rule with the political process deadlocked in the face of the president’s three-month-long absence abroad.
Demonstrations were also staged in Taez, Yemen’s second largest city and a flashpoint in anti-Saleh protests which have swept the impoverished state since late January.
Saleh has been receiving medical treatment in Saudi Arabia for wounds sustained in a June 3 bomb attack on his Sanaa palace compound.
“We have called for intensifying the challenge in order to move towards a peaceful solution,” said Huria Mashhur, spokeswoman of the opposition National Council, an umbrella group of anti-Saleh forces.
“The political process has reached an impasse because of Saleh’s refusal to sign the Gulf plan,” she said, adding that protests should be kept up “until the fall of the regime.”
The Gulf plan proposes that Saleh transfer power to his vice president within 30 days in exchange for a promise of immunity from prosecution.
Saleh vowed last month to return soon.
“We hope that forces loyal to Saleh do not use weapons to disperse the peaceful marches of young people,” Mashhur said, adding that army units which defected to the protest movement were “on alert to defend the protesters.”
“We hope there is no challenge... to avoid an armed confrontation with dangerous consequences,” she said, urging Gulf countries, the United States and European Union “to increase pressure on the regime” to avoid a civil war.
In southern Yemen and Taez, armed tribesmen clashed with Saleh loyalists in the elite Republican Guards at dawn on Sunday, according to local residents, but there was no immediate report of casualties.
Yemen’s ruling party, the General People’s Congress, accused the Common Forum parliamentary opposition bloc — the main component of the National Council — of plotting to “take power by force” by mobilising young protesters.
It held the opposition “responsible for the consequences” of any violence and called for a “serious and responsible dialogue.”