Syrian President has failed to keep promises: UN chief

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday said it is troubling that Syrian President Bashar al Assad has not kept his word on ending violence against civilians in his country.

Ban said Assad had conveyed to him in a telephonic conversation that military operations against protesters had stopped and that the UN humanitarian assistance assessment team would be able to visit different places in the country.

"This is what he clearly told me when I had the telephone talk with him...It is troubling that he has not kept his word," Ban told reporters.

The UN chief said world leaders have urged Assad to "immediately halt military operations that are killing his own people, and he assured me (he would) do that."

Ban said he ‘sincerely’ hoped Assad would pay heed to calls by the international community to bring an end to the months-long violence in his country.

Meanwhile, the United Nations Human Rights Council met for a "special session" on Tuesday to discuss sending another commission to Syria to investigate possible crimes against humanity in the government s crackdown on protesters.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay presented to the Council in Geneva findings of a mission to Syria by her office covering the period from March 15 to July 15.

The draft resolution, which the Council is debating, calls on the Syrian authorities to fully cooperate with a new "independent international commission of inquiry" into alleged violations of international law.

The commission, to be appointed by the Council, would cover the period from July and report back by November end.

It would call on the Syrian government to immediately halt "all human rights violations," including "the continued indiscriminate attacks" on its people.

Pillay said more than 2,200 people have been killed since mass protests began in mid-March, with more than 350 people reportedly killed in Syria since the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

Gaddafi son Saif Al Islam at Tripoli hotel after arrest report

Saif al-Islam, the son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi who rebels and the International Criminal Court said had been arrested, arrived late on Monday at the Tripoli hotel where foreign reporters are staying.

Saif appeared at the Rixos Hotel late at night and spoke to foreign journalists there. Television footage showed him pumping his fists in the air, smiling, waving and shaking hands with supporters, as well as holding

his arms aloft with each hand making the V for victory sign. 

Saif told journalists that Tripoli, which has been largely overrun in the past 24 hours by rebel forces seeking to topple his father, was in fact in government hands and that Muammar Gaddafi was safe. Earlier, armed pro-Gaddafi security mean guarding the hotel took a small group of journalists to Gaddafi's Bab al Aziziyah compound, where they had a meeting with Saif. 

They returned to the hotel accompanied by Saif, who then spoke to journalists in the lobby before taking some of them back to he compound a short distance away for a  brief visit.

Saif said: "I am here to disperse the rumors ...

"This is a war of technology and electronics to cause chaos and terror in Libya. They also brought in armed gangs by sea and by road."

He was referring to a text message sent to mobile phone subscribers in Tripoli on Monday congratulating them on the fall of Muammar Gaddafi. Saif also said that Tripoli was under government control and that he did not care about an arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court in The Hague seeking him and his father for crimes gainst humanity. 

When asked if his father was safe and well in Tripoli, Saif told a journalist: "Of course."

U.S. May Call for Syria’s Assad to Step Down Amid Violence

The Obama administration may call on Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to step down soon, a U.S. official said on condition of anonymity.

Though the U.S. is concerned about the possibility of civil war in Syria, it is more focused on the prospect of sectarian violence promoted by the Assad government and the chance that the Syrian situation will spark instability in the wider Middle East, said the official, who asked not to be identified because the administration is still discussing the issue and considering the timing of a possible announcement about Assad.

A call for Assad to quit would be the strongest U.S. condemnation of his crackdown on dissenters who began an uprising five months ago. The demonstrations are the biggest challenge to Assad’s rule since he inherited power from his father 11 years ago. Human-rights activists who have compiled the names of the dead say Assad’s forces have killed more than 2,400 protesters and detained thousands since mid-March.

Assad yesterday responded to growing criticism about the crackdown by admitting “some mistakes” were made by his security forces in the “initial stages” of unrest. Diplomats representing Brazil, India and South Africa -- a bloc in the United Nations Security Council reluctant to punish Assad -- said in an e-mailed statement that they met in Damascus with the Syrian leader, who told them “efforts were under way to prevent” the mistakes from recurring.

U.S. Freeze

Their appeal to both sides for an end to the violence came as European nations renewed a push for a UN resolution against the bloodshed and the U.S. imposed new financial sanctions on Syrian banks and telecommunications. Pushing back, Syria’s UN ambassador, Bashar Ja’afari, drew parallels between Prime Minister David Cameron’s response to U.K. riots and Syria’s approach to armed “gangs.”

Assad’s admission of errors at the onset of the protests in March doesn’t address the escalation in violence over the past week, said a western diplomat who isn’t authorized to speak publicly. At least four people were killed today in the northern province of Idlib, while one person died yesterday in the Damascus suburb of Saqba and another in the town of Nawa in Daraa province, Mahmoud Merhi, head of the Arab Organization for Human Rights, said by telephone from Damascus.

Deaths During Ramadan

At least 20 anti-government protesters were killed yesterday in Deir al-Zour, Homs and Idlib provinces in the second week of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, said Ammar Qurabi of the National Organization for Human Rights in Syria. Protesters took to the streets late yesterday after breaking their Ramadan fasts and completing evening prayers in Homs, Deir al-Zour, Latakia, suburbs of Damascus and Daraa, Merhi said.

Merhi dismissed government assertions that the army had withdrawn from Hama, which came under assault on July 31, the eve of Ramadan, by tanks, heavy machine-gun fire and armored vehicles. More than 300 people have been killed, mostly in Hama, since security forces escalated the crackdown last week, according to activists.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, who visited Assad two days ago, said today he hadn’t received evidence that tanks re-entered Hama late yesterday. Turkey contacted the governor of Hama late yesterday after seeing reports that the armed forces had returned to the city, and was told by the official that there were no tanks or heavy weapons there, Davutoglu said in televised comments from Ankara.

Signs of Tanks

Turkish journalists crossed the border into Syria today to report on conditions as part of an agreement between Davutoglu and Assad that included Turkey’s demand for the cessation of violence. Their work was restricted and they were escorted by Syrian officials on an indirect route to Hama, Turkey’s state- run Anatolia news service said.

Tanks were seen today about 20 kilometers (12 miles) outside Hama, Anatolia said. Buildings in the city were marked by artillery fire and the streets had signs of tank treads, it said.

Momentum may be building for bolder steps to stop Assad after Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain withdrew their ambassadors from Damascus this week and Turkey said its neighbor is entering a “critical” period.

The U.S. ambassador to the UN, Susan Rice, said Syria would be better off without Assad, repeating the Obama administration’s stance that the leader has lost legitimacy. The New York Times today cited a U.S. diplomatic official as saying the administration doesn’t expect Assad to remain in power and doesn’t rule out a civil war once he falls.

‘It’s the System’

“To the U.S., getting Assad out now would maybe save lives and avoid bigger regional pressures later,” said Theodore Karasik, director of research at the Dubai-based Institute for Near East and Gulf Military Analysis. “However, even if he steps aside, that won’t take care of the problem because it’s not just the person, it’s the system itself.”

While further action is needed, getting the Security Council “on board” in light of Russia-led opposition may prove difficult, said George A. Lopez, a professor of political science at the University of Notre Dame who was on a UN panel of experts monitoring compliance with sanctions. “Only massive and tight arms embargo, oil sanctions and further financial freezes can work now,” he said.

Russia has indicated it isn’t convinced that a UN resolution is needed to stop the repression of protesters.

“What we are telling them is that they need to have serious reforms as soon as possible,” Russia’s UN ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, told reporters yesterday. “We realize that it takes time. Especially in a dramatic situation like this, you cannot carry out reforms overnight. We see encouraging signs.”

In Washington, the Treasury Department said it will freeze the assets of the Commercial Bank of Syria and a subsidiary, the Syrian Lebanese Commercial Bank, as well as mobile-phone company Syriatel.

“We are taking aim at the financial infrastructure that is helping provide support” to Assad, said David S. Cohen, U.S. undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.

Libyan Rebel commander Abdel Fattah Younes killed

Libya's rebel military commander was shot dead in an incident that remained shrouded in mystery, dealing a blow to Western-backed forces labouring in a campaign to topple Muammar Gaddafi.

Rebels said Abdel Fattah Younes, long in the veteran Libyan leader’s inner circle before defecting in February, was shot by assailants on Thursday after he had been summoned from the battlefield for unspecified talks. Some analysts thought Gaddafi agents may have killed him, others that his own side had done so, revealing deep divisions between Gaddafi defectors and those who never worked with him. Neither side in the conflict clarified the matter.

The killing coincided with a new rebel offensive in the west and further international recognition for rebels, which they hope will help unfreeze billions of dollars in Libyan funds. The rebels did not say who killed Younes or where, and said on Thursday they did not yet have his body.

But on Friday, weeping relatives and supporters brought his coffin into the main square of the rebel stronghold of Benghazi to mourn him, and vowed allegiance to remaining rebel leaders. “We got the body yesterday here (in Benghazi), he had been shot with bullets and burned,” Younes’s nephew, Abdul Hakim, said, crying as he followed the coffin through the square. “He had called us at 10 o’clock (on Thursday morning) to say he was on his way here.”

Secret talks Officials would not give details of why Younes was recalled on Thursday to Benghazi from the front line near the oil port of Brega for questioning. Rumours had circulated in Benghazi that he had held secret talks with the Gaddafi government.

“If the rumours that General Younes was feeding information to Gaddafi were there then it would make sense that some rogue elements might attempt to assassinate him,” said Alan Fraser, an analyst with London-based risk consultancy AKE. Rebel defence minister Omar Hariri told Reuters his death was still being investigated and his loss would be great.

Rebels Want Qaddafi to Face ICC

On July 22, the deputy head of Libya's National Transitional Council (NTC), Ali Essawi said that he wanted to see Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi stand trial at the International Criminal Court in Hague.

Deputy head of Libyan NTC Ali Essawi said, "We would like to have Gaddafi taken to the ICC, we would like justice to play its role and we would like to see the crimes paid also. There is no contradictory between the two. No-one can forgive him, even if he left the country. His crimes have touched all over the world, not only the Libyans, even other people and other countries and his terrorist actions, and we cannot forgive him on behalf of the others also."

Ali Essawi added, "Negotiations will be only on the departure of Gaddafi. We will not negotiate on his staying in Libya or ruling the Libyans, this is in principle. His statement belongs to him, as far as we know that Gaddafi will not step down. He is insisting on the killing of the Libyans, he is insisting on the revenge from the Libyans and he will not leave the country or the power"

Last month, the Hague-based ICC issued warrants for the arrest of Gaddafi, his son Saif Al-Islam and Libyan intelligence chief Abdullah Al-Senussi on charges that they ordered the killing of protestors.
Meanwhile, on July 21, Gaddafi addressed thousands of supporters in an audio message saying that he would never negotiate with the rebels. NTC officials rejected his statement.

Gaddafi Increases Chances He Could Stay

The U.S., the U.K., Italy and France now say they’re willing to accept an outcome in Libya that would allow Muammar Gaddafi avoid exile or a trial on war crimes charges.

After conducting four months of daily bombings, NATO-led allies are willing to let Gaddafi stay in Libya on the condition that he gives up power.

“If the Libya people believe an internal solution is acceptable, then Italy agrees,” Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said yesterday in Guangzhou, China, according to ANSA news agency. A spokesman confirmed his comments.

“One of the scenarios effectively envisaged is that he stays in Libya on one condition, which I repeat: that he very clearly steps aside from Libyan political life,” French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said July 20 in a television interview with French news channel LCI.

As the military campaign enters its fifth month, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies want to wrap up a mission that Juppe promised at its March 19 outset “will be counted in days and in weeks, not in months.” Politically, they have pressing concerns at home: For Europeans, it’s saving the euro and for Americans, it’s defending an AAA credit rating by cutting federal spending.

“It shows some desperation, because the entire military operation didn’t deliver what the U.K., France and also the U.S. had hoped for,” Jan Techau, director of Carnegie Europe in Brussels, the European center of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said in a telephone interview. “You get pragmatic and you change the targets.”

‘Regime Change 2.0’

Qaddafi, who seized power of the oil-rich North African nation in a military coup in 1969, still controls the capital, Tripoli, and has threatened to “blow up” the city if the rebels succeed in seizing it.

Techau calls the new strategy “Regime Change 2.0,” permitting exile within Libya. That is a softer take on the original plan, which had been to either let Qaddafi escape to a safe haven or have him stand trial for war crimes at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands.

For the first time, allies and rebels may be prepared to grant Qaddafi’s wish to live out his retirement on his home soil, on the condition he lay down his arms and give up power.

That “is a possibility that can be worked to try and make him leave” power, Mahmoud Jibril, who heads the Transitional National Council, the rebel governing group, told reporters in Madrid yesterday.

 

Leaving Power

“If Qaddafi does not leave power, there is no room for an exchange of ideas,” he said. “We do not intend to negotiate on whether Qaddafi leaves power but on how he leaves power.”

As the fighting continues, Qaddafi’s troops have set explosive charges at petroleum installation in the oil port of Brega as well as at unspecified oilfields, Jibril said, according to the Associated Press.

The June 27 indictment of Qaddafi on charges of crimes against humanity limited his exile options to a handful of countries that did not ratify the Rome treaty that set up the court in 2002.

Still, Qaddafi saw a door open the day after the U.S. and 31 other nations gave the Transitional National Council official recognition as the governing authority in Libya.

U.S. Ambassador to Libya Gene Cretz, Assistant Secretary of State Jeffrey Feltman and National Security Council staff member Derek Chollet held a secret meeting July 16 with representatives of Qaddafi’s inner circle.

U.S.-Libyan Meeting

The face-to-face talks were a sign of U.S. willingness to negotiate with the regime, according to a spokesman for Qaddafi’s government, Moussa Ibrahim. U.S. State Department officials insist that the meeting was not a negotiation and was intended only to deliver the message in person that Qaddafi must step down.

Either way, U.S. officials don’t exclude the possibility of Qaddafi staying in Libya as long as he steps aside.

“He needs to be removed from power or remove himself from power,” White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters July 20. “It is up to the Libyan people to decide what his future is beyond that, I mean, so it’s not for us to say.”

Robert Danin, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, said that the longer the military campaign drags on, the harder it becomes to keep the coalition together. Time has played in Qaddafi’s favor, as it “seems to have strengthened his negotiating position,” Danin said in a telephone interview.

 

‘Palpable Option’

By flitting between conciliatory overtures and threats, Qaddafi has kept his opponents guessing what his next move will be or whether the end to the conflict will come only with his capture or death.

“Qaddafi’s message is, ‘Like hell am I leaving Tripoli; give me something I can work with or come get me,’” said Alessandro Politi, a former adviser to the Italian Defense Ministry. “The allies realize they can’t keep demanding he cede power if they don’t give him a palpable option of where to go.”

The “best” outcome would be for Qaddafi to leave Libya and stand trial in The Hague, Gavin Cook, a spokesman for the U.K. Foreign Office, said in a telephone interview yesterday. “But what happens to Qaddafi is ultimately up to the Libyan people, and they should determine his future.”

Letting Qaddafi stay does pose risks and could destabilize a country that was stitched together in 1929, when Tripolitania and Cyrenaica were united as one colonial province under the Italians. Qaddafi has held the country together in his four decades in power.

“Is he going to be safe five, 10 years down the line is what he will be asking himself,” Politi said. “Will the authorities catch up with him or someone try and kill him?”

Lack of Coordination Hampers Libya's Rebels

Ahmad Harari, a Libyan rebel fighting to overthrow Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, recounted how he was almost killed last week. He was part of a small group of fighters assigned to defend a front- line position in Qawalish, a village in Libya's arid western highlands.

Then Colonel Qaddafi's military attacked, rushing forward in pickup trucks. Mr. Harari said he had only 18 cartridges for his rifle, roughly the same amount of ammunition carried by everyone in his group. Within minutes he ran out. "Every man lost all of his bullets and tried to escape," he said. A friend was captured, killed and mutilated, he said, but the others managed to get away.

While the Libyan rebels have carved out an enclave in the west, the dearth of ammunition in Mr. Harari's group points to one of the continuing drains on their military strength - an absence of coordination, even on matters as basic as making sure that ample ammunition is provided to the front-line fighters. As Libya's uprising-turned-desert- war enters its sixth month, the rebels in the mountains have assembled into small bands of local fighters.

These groups - often named for the towns the fighters come from - have demonstrated both an eagerness to fight and a willingness to work with almost anyone who can help them reach their goal of ousting the Qaddafi family from power. But coordination between them, as well as logistical help from their higher commands and foreign supporters, has not developed in important ways.

In eastern Libya, the rebel authorities talk of making a national army; here in the west, the state of official disorganization makes the prospects for such a force unlikely in the near term. Interviews with dozens of rebels present a portrait of a guerrilla force that acts less like a coherent structure than a network of pickup fighting clubs. Groups share common goals but are undermined by local rivalries. Orders from the senior regional command are followed arbitrarily, including, in Qawalish, orders not to loot.

Information flows only partly up and down the chain of command. Many fighters say they suspect others of hoarding weapons and ammunition, and withholding essential supplies. And when they fight, the different groups can move haphazardly about the battlefield, each according to its own will, while the senior commanders - many of them former officers in Colonel Qaddafi's army - remain far back, out of harm and sight. Some former pro-Qaddafi officers have declined to participate in the fighting, the rank-and-file rebels say, making the chief value of these defectors their political significance, not how they can influence the direction of a bitter, village-by- village ground war.

One fighter from Gharyan, one of the cities held by Colonel Qaddafi's forces that is now in the rebels' sights, described the Gharyani fighters' request to a defector, an air force colonel, to lead them to reclaim their homes. "We asked him to be our commander," said the fighter, Ziad, who requested that his last name be withheld to protect his family. "He said, 'No, the only thing I know is office jobs.' And we don't have a commander yet."

The rebels in the mountains cut across many boundaries, and often the composition of their units breaks through distinctions in class, ethnicity and tribe. Side by side in fighting groups are university students and their professors, laborers and accountants, lawyers and petroleum engineers. In one group, an air traffic controller worked beside a lecturer from Gharyan University's faculty of law.

Few of these men claim to have had any military experience before taking up arms this year. Considering their circumstances and backgrounds, their tactical success has been remarkable. The impoverished population began the war with few arms with which to fight a conventional force, yet the rebels, aided by NATO air power, have chased Colonel Qaddafi's soldiers from much of Libya's highlands.

Many villages on the high plateau today are independent of Colonel Qaddafi's rule. Some, like Jadu, are also safe enough that families who had fled the fighting have returned. But there is also a strong sense among these men that what is behind them, from a military perspective, was not as challenging as what lies ahead, and that their low level of organization may add to the difficulties. Politically and socially, many of the villages captured thus far were strongly anti-Qaddafi. But many of the towns and cities on the roads to Tripoli, the capital, have split loyalties.

A few tilt in favor of the Qaddafi clan. Intertribal grievances have become a visible factor, too - which could make the fighting fiercer and more widespread. And tactically, the approaches to some of the cities lie across the open desert, where the rebels could find themselves more vulnerable to the Qaddafi garrisons' artillery and mortar fire. Moreover, as Colonel Qaddafi's forces have suffered attrition, they have seemed to rely more on land mines to defend their positions, a menace that could drive up rebel losses when they move forward.

With the holy month of Ramadan set to begin in early August, and daytime desert temperatures often climbing above 100 degrees, the pace of fighting has slowed. The duties of many groups are often as simple as rotating through daylong shifts watching over the front. But these shifts offer insights into the weakness of the rebel command.

Rebels from Yafran standing duty at the front line on Monday said that their fighting group had fewer rifles than men, and when they were assigned to front-line duties they were issued a rifle for one day that they had to return to their base the next. They are also issued little ammunition. And tellingly, in more than two weeks of interviews with fighters, not one said he had seen the rifles and machine guns France has said it supplied to the rebels in the spring.

Each man said his rifle had been scavenged from the battlefield. Many wondered who among their leaders had kept or withheld the guns. The shortages are a drag on the rebels' strength. Before the recent battle for Kikla, the rebels said they had more than 200 fighters, but only 89 military rifles and limited ammunition. "We have belief," said Ibrahim Suraya, the leader of the local civilian council. "This is our gun." The mountains are awash with bravado, and many fighters echo such statements. God is with us, they say. Victory or death, others add.

Still, others wonder why there is enough ammunition to fire in long bursts at funerals in the cities, but not enough for battle. Jamal Akhmad, a 52-year-old petroleum engineer waiting with younger men for the next battle, was looking for more than slogans. He spoke calmly and without bitterness as he shared a front-line soldier's view. His complaint was as old as revolution and war. "People get comfortable, sitting in their chairs, and they forget about the people," he said. "Even this is true of our own committee."

Libyan officials sought guarantees Gaddafi would not be pursued for war crimes

Libyan representatives sought guarantees Col Muammar Gaddafi would not be pursued for war crimes if he stepped down during talks with US officials.

Diplomats involved in contacts with Libyan officials said that Tripoli sought talks with Washington as part of a series of informal negotiations on Col Gaddafi's future. But while French mediators last week insisted that Col Gaddafi must leave Libya, a move that would make him vulnerable to arrest and war crimes charges, American diplomats only insisted that the dictator give up power.

European diplomats said on Tuesday that America, which is not a member of the World Court, could formally put its weight behind a deal to scrap UN sanctions that authorised war crime charges. "There is open question here of an American role but the Americans have also been very clear that they delivered a message and not launch negotiations," a European diplomat said.

Libyan emissaries have held a series of meetings with Turkish, French and South African officials in previous weeks. Unnamed regime officials met senior American diplomats in Tunis on Saturday. "There have been a number of indications that talks behind the scenes are going on and the feeling is that these centre on Gaddafi continuing to live in Libya or being allowed a dignified exile, probably somewhere in Africa," said Oliver Miles, a former British ambassador who has met Gaddafi loyalists in recent weeks.

A US official was unequivocal in saying that the only message given to Col Gaddafi in the meeting was that he should stand down. "This was not a negotiation. It was the delivery of a message," the official said. The French defence minister yesterday said pressure on Col Gaddafi to seek a negotiated exit had risen but warned the Libyan leader could still hold out.

"The countdown has begun," said Gerard Longuet, the defence minister who last week called for immediate talks with Col Gaddafi. "I am cautious because Gaddafi is not rational and he could opt for a bunker strategy, taking the whole civilian population of Tripoli hostage." "As panic takes over in the ranks around Gaddafi, we are seeing more and more emissaries of all types who are touring world capitals," he said.

"When one of those comes within our range our message is always the same: Gaddafi must go." Libyan rebels launched a full- scale attack on the oil town of Brega on Thursday, taking significant casualties as they fought through the streets on Saturday and Sunday. They are also having to deal with extensive minefields and traps full of chemicals, they have said. The Transitional National Council on Monday claimed that only a small pocket of 150-200 loyalist fighters were holding out.

The French foreign ministry backed the rebels' statement. "The Libyan resistance forces are in the process of controlling the totality of the city," the spokesman, Bernard Valero, said. "It represents progress on the ground by the action of Libyan rebel forces. It would seem to confirm the retreat and isolation of Gaddafi and his forces." The rebels have made no significant gains on the eastern front since March, and the loss of Brega would be a major blow for Col Gaddafi.

Antiaircraft Missiles On the Loose in Libya

Five months after the armed uprising erupted in Libya, a new round of portable antiaircraft missiles - weapons that governments fear could be obtained by terrorists and then fired at civilian jetliners - have been slipping from storage bunkers captured by rebels.

In February, in the early stages of the uprising, large numbers of the missiles slipped from the hands of Col. Muammar el- Qaddafi's government as the rebels established control over eastern Libya and the ammunition depots there. The leakage resumed recently with rebel gains here in the western mountains, which opened up new ammunition stores.

The new leakage of the missiles, which are of the same type that officials in other African nations have said have already been trafficked over Libya's borders, underscores the organizational weakness of the forces opposed to Colonel Qaddafi; it also raises concerns that if more Qaddafi depots fall to the rebels, then further stocks of the weapons could become accessible to black markets.

Signs of the diversion are readily visible here, at an ammunition depot captured late last month from the Qaddafi forces after repeated NATO bombings. On a recent day, 43 emptied wooden crates - long, thin and painted in dark green - had been left behind on the sand inside the entrance. The boxes had not been there during a visit to the same spot a few days before, and the weapons were gone.

The stenciled markings showed each crate had contained a pair of lightweight missiles called SA-7s - early Soviet versions of the same class of weapon as the better known American-made Stingers, which were used by Afghan fighters against the Soviets in Afghanistan. It was not clear who had taken them. The rebel guards variously blamed Qaddafi forces and misinformed opposition fighters.

New Leaks of Antiaircraft Missiles From Rebel-Held Bunkers in Libya During more than four decades in power, Colonel Qaddafi's often bellicose government is thought to have acquired as many as 20,000 of these missiles, known as Manpads, for Man-Portable Air-Defense Systems, in arms deals with the former Eastern bloc.

Many are assumed to remain in the Qaddafi military's custody, American officials say, and others have been fired in the conflict, meaning that the number loose is most likely much smaller than the original stock. There has been no publicly available evidence that Libya's rebels are directly involved in missile trafficking. Rebel leaders say that if their fighters have taken any missiles, they meant to use them in battle, and that they say they suspect soldiers in the Qaddafi military of selling and smuggling these kinds of arms.

But American officials and Western security analysts say there are grave worries that once the weapons inherited by rebels have been made accessible and reach unsupervised hands, opportunistic smugglers can match them to potential buyers. In a telephone interview, Andrew J. Shapiro, assistant secretary of state for political- military affairs, described the unsecured missiles in Libya as "one of the things that keep me up at night."

Two other American officials, speaking anonymously so as not to upset diplomatic relations with the rebels, said that after the initial leakage of the SA-7s the American government repeatedly asked the National Transitional Council, the de facto rebel authority, to collect and secure the missiles and to prevent more missiles from getting loose. When the depot here at Ga'a fell, however, those requests appeared to have had little effect.

"The rebels came from all over the western mountains, and they just took what they wanted," said Riyad, a supervisor of the ruined arsenal's small contingent of rebel guards.

Gaddafi has plan to blow up capital Tripoli

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has a "suicidal plan" to blow up the capital Tripoli if it is taken by rebels, the Kremlin's special envoy to Libya told a Russian newspaper on Thursday.

"The Libyan premier told me, if the rebels seize the city, we will cover it with missiles and blow it up," Kremlin envoy Mikhail Margelov said in an interview with the Izvestia daily.
Margelov met Libyan Prime Minister Baghdadi al-Mahmudi last month. "I imagine that the Gaddafi regime does have such a suicidal plan," he added, saying that Gaddafi still had plentiful supplies of missiles and ammunition.

But Margelov, who has had rare access to senior Libyan officials, questioned reports that Gaddafi could be running out of arms in the drawn-out conflict. Gaddafi had still not used a single surface- to-surface missile, he argued. "Tripoli theoretically could lack ammunition for tanks, cartridges for rifles. But the colonel has got plenty of missiles and explosives."

Margelov met the Libyan prime minister on June 16 in Tripoli after holding talks in Benghazi earlier the same month. He has not met Gaddafi himself. Russia abstained from a vote on a March UN Security Council resolution that opened the way for foreign involvement and has since criticised the campaign -- particularly arms drops by France.

Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov met US secretary of state Hillary Clinton on Wednesday for talks on Libya, where Lavrov sought to play down differences between the countries. However, the Russian foreign ministry said on Wednesday that Moscow would not take part in talks on Libya later this week in Turkey, which has also seen itself as a mediator in the conflict.

Egypt fires more than 600 top police officers

In a purge aimed at appeasing antigovernment protesters, Egyptian authorities fire 669 police officials linked to the regime of former President Hosni Mubarak.

The move comes as parliamentary elections are delayed. Egypt fired more than 600 high-ranking police officers Wednesday in a purge aimed at appeasing thousands of antigovernment protesters in Cairo's Tahrir Square amid deepening divisions over wiping away the remnants of former President Hosni Mubarak's regime.

The move came on the same day the military council ruling the country announced that parliamentary elections planned for September would be delayed until October or November. The postponement will help new political parties challenge the more experienced Muslim Brotherhood, which was expected to win at least 25% of the seats in parliament.

Secular parties had pressed for a delay, fearing that a parliament heavily influenced by the Muslim Brotherhood's conservative agenda would threaten human rights and religious tolerance. The Islamist organization's reach may be further diminished by new regulations for choosing the 100-member assembly that will draft a new constitution. The firing of 669 police officers was the biggest reshuffle in the Interior Ministry's history.

It includes 505 brigadier generals, 82 colonels and 37 officers charged in the deaths of hundreds of protesters during the weeks-long revolution that overthrew Mubarak on Feb. 11. The announcement came during the sixth day of demonstrations in Tahrir Square by activists seeking to pressure the interim government to bring Mubarak and members of his regime to justice.

The government and military council fear that the return of tents and banners to the square will further disrupt a nation facing labor strikes, a troubled economy and political unrest. "The firings are to gradually dismantle the police state we used to live in," said Ammar Ali Hassan, head of the Middle East Center for research and political studies.

"Protesters have succeeded in forcing security officials and the police into such changes, despite police efforts to keep the system they had before the Jan. 25 revolution." So far, only one police officer has been found guilty of killing demonstrators last winter. He was sentenced to death. The country is awaiting the trials of Mubarak and former Interior Minister Habib Adli, both of whom have been accused in the deaths of protesters.

Libyan rebels desperately short of funds

Even as rebel commanders predict victory is near, the rebel leadership is short of cash to fight the rebellion and run civilian affairs.
The lucrative oil industry has been shut down by the fighting.

In early April, Mazin Ramadan left his American wife and two children in Seattle and flew to this Libyan rebel stronghold to help the opposition sort out its shaky finances.

Three months later, things are looking as bleak as ever. "We're broke," said Ramadan, a Libyan American who founded a software tech company in Seattle and advises the rebel Transitional National Council on finances and oil. Even as rebel commanders predict that victory over Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi is near, the rebel leadership is desperately short of cash to fight the rebellion and run civilian affairs.

The lucrative Libyan oil industry, which normally earns billions of dollars in hard currency, has been shut down by the fighting. Salaries for the rebel government's workers haven't been paid in two months. There is precious little cash to buy the imported fuel needed for the war effort and for the economy in eastern Libya, which the rebels control.

The council is beseeching Arab and Western nations to offer cash or credit. "We're getting decimated on the financial front lines," Ramadan said this week. As he spoke, the lights flickered and died in the conference room at a villa dating to the Italian colonial era that serves as a council office in downtown Benghazi. Fuel shortages have forced daily six-hour brownouts.

The council has been buying fuel in Europe on credit. But last week, a European financial company that had provided $500 million in loans told the council that it could no longer shoulder the risk and shut down the credit line. About $100 million donated by Qatar has nearly been spent, Ramadan said, and $200 million promised by Turkey has yet to arrive.

Several tankers loaded with fuel from Europe have left the Benghazi port without unloading after the council couldn't pay cash, he said. The vast petrochemical complexes at Port Brega and Ras Lanuf, seized from the rebels by government forces this spring, have been shut down. Also closed is the natural gas pipeline that normally fuels electricity production in Benghazi and other eastern cities. That means that rebel leaders in the country that is the world's 17th-largest producer of oil must import all their fuel.

Several nations have promised to provide cash, Ramadan said, but only Qatar has delivered. "We hear a lot of promises, but it's a lot easier to promise than to deliver," he said. "We don't count on it unless it's sitting in our account." Ramadan said he is pursuing new credit lines. His two cellphones rang constantly as he spoke. The council has sought loan guarantees backed by billions of dollars in frozen Libyan government assets overseas. But weeks of negotiations have failed to pry loose guarantees,

Ramadan said. In a July 7 letter to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, four U.S. senators led by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) asked Clinton to help unlock the assets for Libyan humanitarian aid. The letter reminded Clinton of her recent promise to help put the rebel council "on firmer financial footing." Rebel finances "are in a perilous state," the letter said. The United States has authorized $25 million in nonlethal military assistance to the rebels and $53 million in humanitarian aid.

But Ramadan said loan guarantees backed by frozen Libyan assets would have a much bigger effect on the effort to topple Kadafi, a declared U.S. policy goal. The main crisis in the east is financial, not humanitarian. Thanks to unusually heavy winter rains, eastern Libya is flush with grains, fruits and vegetables.

Libyan strongman Muammar Gaddafi prepared to leave

France says it has had contacts with envoys from Muammar Gaddafi who say the Libyan leader is "prepared to leave".

"The Libyan regime is sending messengers everywhere, to Turkey, to New York, to Paris" offering to discuss Col Gaddafi's exit, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe told French radio.

But he added that such contacts did not constitute negotiations. France played a key role in launching Nato- led strikes in Libya, under a UN-mandated mission to protect civilians. Mr Juppe told France Info radio on Tuesday: "We are receiving emissaries who are telling us: 'Gaddafi is prepared to leave. Let's discuss it.' "There are contacts but it's not a negotiation proper at this stage."

Mr Juppe did not say who the emissaries were. French foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said: "These are emissaries who say they are coming in the name of Gaddafi. What is important is that we send them the same message and stay in close contact with our allies on this."

Col Gaddafi remains in power in Tripoli despite almost four months of air strikes by international forces, leading to fears of stalemate. Rebels are holding eastern Libya and pockets in the west, but have not made decisive moves towards the capital. France and other coalition countries have insisted that the Libyan leader must stand down for hostilities to end.

"There is a consensus on how to end the crisis, which is that Gaddafi has to leave power," Mr Juppe reiterated.

Libyan rebels boost firepower with homemade weapons

Sadiq Mubakar Krain's blue overalls are soaked with sweat as he works on an improvised rocket launcher for the rebels fighting Muammar Gaddafi.

"This is the first time I make one of these," said Krain, 52, pointing to a launcher that consists of 16 rocket tubes scavenged from a military helicopter. A bespectacled former foreman at an oil company, Krain has fixed the tubes in a welded frame and is working on the electronics that will allow rebel fighters to fire individual rockets at will.

"I have learned to make other things and to weld, so God willing, I have got this one right," Krain said at workshop where he and his colleagues build weapons out of whatever they can lay their hands on. The ingenuity on display is a product of necessity. The Misrata rebels have captured some weapons and others are shipped to them via the city's port.

But heavy arms are in short supply and those the rebels have obtained need to be adapted to match the firepower and mobility of the government forces they are fighting. The rebels in Misrata, Libya's third largest city about 200 km (130 miles) east of Tripoli, have been fighting for the past four months to end Gaddafi's 41-year rule.

They have moved the front line from inside this city to the outskirts of Zlitan, a neighboring town now blocking the rebels' advance toward Tripoli. The intense pace of the workers in this shop near the center of Misrata -- who include former teachers, engineers and a truck driver -- suggests the rebels are preparing the munitions for the next push toward Zlitan. MEND AND MAKE DO Until now, the workshop has been focused on repairing equipment.

When the front line moved forward last week, most of the workers here were transferred to a new repair shop closer to Zlitan so that gun crews did not have to drive 36 km (20 miles) each way to have their weapons fixed. The shop in Misrata still handles major repairs, but is now concentrating on preparing new weapons and the trucks on which to mount them.

The pace is intense -- work goes on from early in the morning to late at night seven days a week. The main job is to build new housings for heavy machine guns and anti-aircraft guns that will be mounted on the back of pickup trucks. The weapons are placed facing backwards so the vehicles reverse into position to open fire.

There are about 10 new welded steel mounts nearly ready for 14.5 mm machine guns taken from tanks or helicopters to be attached, while one is ready to go. Instead of an electronic system to move it, the gun can be adjusted manually up and down or side to side. The trigger works using the brake line from a small car and there is a rudimentary safety catch.

LOADING BULLETS Salah Mohammed, 45, proudly shows off the new gun, plus a homemade round for it made using used scavenged casings. The workshop has also devised a basic welded tool with a handle to push the rounds into the links that will feed the ammunition into the machine gun, something that cannot be done by hand. "One press of the trigger," Mohammed says, pressing the trigger for a second to demonstrate, "is nine bullets." "So we need many bullets." In the corner, workers attach steel plates to an ancient pickup truck.

Mohammed, a former engineer at an oil company, says the truck was an old wreck but its engine has been rebuilt. By far the most feverish activity among the 35 workers in the workshop is centered on a small group working to finish rebuilding an anti-aircraft gun. The workers have stripped the gun, which has a seat for the gunner, of its four 14.5 mm machine guns and replaced them with two 23 mm anti-aircraft guns.

Krain says the change of caliber is partly because the bigger guns have a range of 6 km compared with the 4 km of the 14.5 mm guns. But he says it also because the gun has a psychological impact on the pro-Gaddafi troops. "When they hear the sound the gun makes," he pauses to make a long, deep 'doof, doof, doof' sound to mimic the gun, "they run away." Krain, his hands coated in oil, returns to work on his rocket launcher.

"I want to help finish the war by Ramadan," he says. Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting and prayer, starts in early August. "Our work will not be over then, we have much to do. But I want the fighting to stop by then."

Gaddafi forces launch counter attack

FORCES loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi have launched a counterattack against rebel advance positions 50km southwest of Tripoli.

Loyalist forces fired half a dozen Grad rockets into the hamlet of Gualish.

The rebels replied with anti-tank fire as they sought to maintain their grip on Gualish, a key gateway on the road to the capital Tripoli that they seized on Wednesday.

Just hours before the government attack, NATO warplanes bombed positions in the area, the correspondent said. A colonel in the rebel forces said the raid struck near Asablah, 17km from Gualish.

In its daily update, the Western military alliance said its planes carried out 48 strike sorties on Saturday, with the focus on Misrata.

Meanwhile, rebel troops advancing into the loyalist stronghold of Zliten said today they lost one fighter and had 32 wounded by landmines laid by Gaddafi's retreating troops.

Insurgents pressing out westward from the long-besieged city of Misrata said the ordnance was laid by Gaddafi loyalists falling back from their positions around Zliten.

Zliten, once considered a bastion of Gaddafi forces, is a key link on the road from rebel-held Misrata to Tripoli.

Libyan rebels said they were preparing on Saturday to push forward in their drive on Tripoli from both the south and west in a bid to isolate Gaddafi in his ever-closer capital.

But the embattled leader remained defiant, telling supporters on Friday that "the regime in Libya will not fall."

After heavy fighting, rebel fighters captured the desert hamlet of Gualish on Wednesday, taking them closer to the strategic garrison town Gharyan and the last major objective standing between them and Tripoli to the north.

For now, they have set their sights on Asablah, on the road to Gharyan, 80km from Tripoli.

A second target in a three-pronged strategy is the coastal city of Zawiyah, one of the last major loyalist strongholds west of Tripoli.

And from a base in Misrata, 215 kilometres east of the capital, the rebels reported on Friday battling to within 2km of the centre of Zliten town with the loss of five dead and 17 wounded.

"When we take Zliten, enforced with Misrata, it gives us a clear path" to Tripoli, rebel spokesman Colonel Ahmed Omar Bani said.

Syrian forces 'ordered to shoot to kill'

 

  Syrian security forces have reportedly killed more than 1,400 people and detained 10,000 others since March

Defectors of Syria’s security forces have described receiving orders from their superiors to fire live rounds at protesters to disperse them, according to Human Rights Watch.

The New York-based rights body released a statement on Saturday detailing interviews with eight soldiers and four members of secret security agencies it said had defected to the opposition since anti-government protests erupted in March.

The interviewees said they had participated in the government crackdown in the Syrian cities of Deraa, Izraa, Baniyas, Homs, Jisr al-Shughur, Aleppo, and Damascus, the capital.

The soldiers also reported participating in and witnessing the shooting and wounding of dozens of protesters, and the arbitrary arrests and detentions of hundreds of civilians.

All the interviewees told HRW that their superiors had told them that they were fighting infiltrators, salafists, and terrorists, but were surprised to encounter unarmed protesters instead. They said they were ordered to fire on the civilians, including children, in a number of instances.

The defectors also reported that those who refused orders to shoot on protesters ran the risk of being shot themselves. One of them said they witnessed a military officer shoot and kill two soldiers in Deraa for rejecting orders.

Syria's government has not responded to the allegations.

Human Rights Watch interviewed the defectors in person in Lebanon, Turkey, and Jordan. Most of the interviewees gave testimony on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

"The testimony of these defectors provides further evidence that the killing of protesters was no accident but a result of a deliberate policy by senior figures in Syria to use deadly force to disperse protesters," said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.

"Syrian soldiers and officials should know that they too have not just a right but a duty to refuse such unlawful orders, and that those who deliberately kill or injure peaceful protesters will be subject to prosecution."

"The accounts of soldiers who were horrified enough at their commanders’ orders and deceit to flee should send a message to the UN and other countries that they need to do more to put a stop to these brutal attacks on civilians," Whitson said.

Syrian security forces have killed more than 1,400 people and detained 10,000 others since March, according to Syrian rights groups.

Member of Syria's secret police - Homs

One member of Syria’s secret police - referred to locally as mukhabarat - told HRW he was deployed in Homs, Syria’s third largest city, on April 19, to help security forces violently disperse tens of thousands of protesters staging a sit-in in the central Clock Tower Square.

"The protesters had sat down in the square. We were told to disperse them with violence if needed. We were there with air force security, army, and shabbiha (armed supporters of the government who do not belong to security forces). At around 3:30am, we got an order... to shoot at the protesters. We were shooting for more than half an hour."

"There were dozens and dozens of people killed and wounded. Thirty minutes later, earth diggers and fire trucks arrived. The diggers lifted the bodies and put them in a truck. I don’t know where they took them. The wounded ended up at the military hospital in Homs. And then the fire trucks started cleaning the square."

Soldier of Presidential Guard - Damascus

A conscript who was a member of the Presidential Guard recounted how he was deployed on April 18 to Harasta, a suburb of Damascus, to quell a protest.

"They gave each one of us a Kalashnikov (rifle) with two magazines, and there was more ammunition in the vehicles. They also gave us electric tasers. They told us we were being sent to fight the gangs because security services needed reinforcement. We were surprised (when we got to Harasta) because we couldn’t see any gangs, just civilians, including some women and children, in the street, and members of the mukhabarat firing at them.

"I was in a group with five other soldiers from my unit. We received clear orders to shoot at civilians from the Presidential Guard officers and from the 4th military battalion, although normally we don't get orders from other units.

"The exact orders were "load and shoot." There were no conditions, no prerequisites. We got closer to the demonstrators, and when we were some five metres away, the officers shouted "fire!" At that moment, the five of us defected and ran over to the demonstrators’ side throwing our weapons to them while running away."

Sergeant Raqeeb Awwal - Al-Hara

Raqeeb Awwal, a first sergeant, who was posted in the southern town of al-Hara, near Deraa, described the orders his squad received when the army circled the town on May 10.

"Snipers were on rooftops. Their orders were, 'If anyone goes out on the street, detain or shoot'. I recall watching a guy go out to smoke outside and then being shot and killed by a sniper."

He also described the arrest campaign against protesters, including children, in the town.

"We surrounded the town for days. I saw how the snipers would shoot on anyone who went out of his house. Then we moved in. The mukhabarat who were with us had lists of people to arrest.

"They had details: this person tore a poster of the president or this person shouted "with excitement" at an anti-government protest. I saw many of those detained and some looked as young as 12.

"Six buses came and took the detained. We then gathered all the motorbikes in the town’s centre, and a tank crushed them. We talked among ourselves about how some soldiers stole gold and money from houses. In one house, a colleague told me that they found one million Syrian pounds (around $20,000) and his commanding officer decided to confiscate the money saying it was being used to purchase weapons even though my colleague told me there was no such evidence.

He added that the army opened fire in the coastal town of Bayda on members of security services wearing civilian clothes because they mistook their identity. Other defectors reported that security services later dressed in army clothes to avoid such shootings.

Sniper - Izraa

A conscript trained as a sniper was deployed in Izraa, a town near Deraa, on April 25, three days after security forces had shot 28 protesters over two days, told HRW:

"I was in Squad 14 of the 4th Regiment. We were around 300 soldiers deployed to Izraa. I had heard so much about foreign armed groups that I was eager to fight them.

"But then [we received] the following orders: 'Don’t shoot at the armed civilians (Syrian secret police). They are with us. Shoot at the people whom they shoot at'.

"We were all shocked after hearing his words, as we had imagined that the people were killed by foreign armed groups, not by the security forces. We realised that our orders were to shoot at our own people."

Soldier - Deraa

A soldier who was deployed for a month in Daraa before defecting on June 1, said:

"We received orders to kill protesters. Some military refused the orders and were shot with a handgun. Two were killed in front of me, by someone in the rank of lieutenant (muqaddam). I don’t know his name. He said they were traitors."

Soldier of Special Forces - Baniyas and Markeb

A member of regiment 45 in the Special Forces, deployed in the coastal areas of Baniyas and Markeb, told HRW about the arrest campaign he witnessed in the village of Markeb:

"We had around 400 names of people whom we wanted to detain. We went to the village. Then a woman’s protest came out refusing the entry of the army (we had not yet detained anyone) inside the village.

"We started going into homes. We would break into closed houses. We detained so many people. Some men tried to escape through a side road in a valley. But the army opened fire on those trying to escape. We brought those detained to the center of the village, stepping on them and insulting them.

"A security officer stood on a man, yelling "Who is your god? (Say) Bashar al-Asad." We had so many detainees in the area that we used the Banyas stadium as a detention facility."

The soldier also said that the security forces detained children.

"I saw the list of wanted individuals. So many were born in 1993, 1994, 1995. Mere teenagers," he said.

"We later entered Baniyas and also detained men and children. By the end of our first day in Baniyas, I asked an officer how many detainees we had taken that day; he said around 2,500 in Baniyas alone, all taken to the Baniyas stadium. People would get beaten in the bus on the way there and in the stadium as well."

Lieutenant - Damascus

A lieutenant in squad 14, posted in Damascus, described the briefing:

"Each morning we had guidance briefings. They would tell us there are gangs and infiltrators. They would show us pictures of dead soldiers and security forces."

Soldier - Damascus

Soldiers were reportedly not allowed to watch television in private to avoid any of them watching TV channels that aired anti-government information. Officers could watch television but only Syrian state television and Dunya TV, a pro-government channel owned by Rami Makhlouf, a cousin and close ally of President Bashar al-Asad.

A conscript doing his military service in Damascus said:

"Every night they used to summon us in a stadium-like place in the military barrack and make us watch Dunya TV from a big TV screen. It was all scenes from Deraa showing people killed by what they reported as foreign armed groups.

"Officers would repeatedly tell us that there is a 'foreign plot' going on in Deraa. Watching Dunya TV every night between 20:00 and 22:00, we had the firm belief that there is a foreign conspiracy against which we need to fight and protect our people."

Soldier of Special Missions Unit - Aleppo

A member of the Special Missions Unit, an elite unit under the jurisdiction of the Interior Ministry, described his unit’s role in cracking down on university students in Aleppo:

"We were sent to the university dorms to arrest people, with a simple order: 'Go in and detain'.

"We must have detained more than 200 people in one day around late April and early May. We wanted to scare them and other students to prevent them from protesting again. Our job was to detain the students and take them to the branches of the mukhabarat, mostly Military Intelligence.

"We would beat people all the way to the bus. We didn’t know what would happen to the detainees after we dropped them off with the mukhabarat."

Syria troops kill 22 in Hama crackdown

Syrian troops killed at least 22 people in a crackdown they launched in the flashpoint central city of Hama, a human rights group said Wednesday.

"At least 22 people were killed in Hama and more than 80 wounded, some of them seriously," Ammar Qurabi of the National Organisation for Human Rights said.

"The wounded are being treated in two hospitals in Hama," he said in a statement, adding that troops had entered the Al-Hurani hospital.

"A large number of Hama residents have fled either to the nearby town of Al-Salamiya or twoards Damascus," Qurabi said.

The US State Department on Tuesday urged the Syrian regime to withdraw its forces from Hama, a city of 800,000 people that saw a massive anti-government demonstration by as many as half a million people last Friday.

"We urge the government of Syria to immediately halt its intimidation and arrest campaign, to pull its security forces back from Hama and other cities, and to allow Syrians to express their opinions freely so that a genuine transition to democracy can take place," State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland said.

Libya Looks Toward Talks, But Quick Results Unlikely

There are reports of talks between representatives of the Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi and members of the opposition that have been fighting to oust him since February. There is skepticism about the potential for a quick solution among analysts.

The Libyan conflict has been marked by a series of rebel advances followed by Gadhafi's regime counterattacks. Progress on the ground has been slow in spite of more than 5,000 airstrikes by NATO war planes since the end of March.

Some NATO officials have, from time to time, predicted Gadhafi’s imminent downfall, but that has not happened.

Alia Brahimi of the London School of Economics is encouraged by reports of talks to end the conflict. “In Libya the end game has to be a negotiated settlement. I think that the news today is very positive. We’ve always been hoping that there’s been a political process in the background," she said.

Brahimi says there is more to the Libyan regime than Gadhafi and his family. She says some groups - like tribes - are willing to see Gadhafi go if their interests are protected. “The only way out of this was going to be for elements of the regime to defect, to reach an agreement and then for some sort of exit strategy to be provided by them to Gadhafi. And I think the only thing that could make that scenario possible is talks," she said.

Brahimi says talks could allow both sides to avoid having to live up to their shared slogan: fight to the death.

An early advocate of western intervention is former British Ambassador to Libya Richard Dalton. He says pressure from the NATO mission, combined with internal dissent from regime supporters, will ultimately end Gadhafi’s 42-year reign.

But Dalton says it could take another two months or more to hapen. “I do believe that those pressures are steadily building up and that in due course there will be a series of risings against the Libyan regime, against Colonel Gadhafi and his family, of the kind that we saw back in February and which were so savagely suppressed. This time, if it happens I believe the result will be a change of regime in Libya," he said.

Meanwhile, the African Union has been trying to get formal Libyan peace talks going. At the end of their recent summit, leaders endorsed a plan to co-sponsor Libya talks with the United Nations and other international organizations.

But Richard Dalton says an arrest warrant recently issued for Gadhafi by the International Criminal Court makes it difficult for the United Nations to get involved, or for a new Libyan government to allow Gadhafi to stay. "There’s been some talk of him staying in Libya but outside the political struggle. I do think that was always unrealistic. It’s even more unrealistic now that there is an arrest warrant from the ICC against him," he said.

But Dalton says the ICC move will not necessarily make it more difficult for Gadhafi to flee Libya, if he decides to do so, because many countries are willing to ignore the indictment. Other analysts say it does complicate his ability to find refuge.

Libyan crisis must be solved by political means

A former Algerian diplomat said the solution to the crisis in Libya must be political, involving the United Nations, the Arab League (AL) and the African Union (AU), local La Tribune newspaper reported Monday.

"Contrary to Egypt and Tunisia, what's happening in Libya is a civil war ... Consequently, such a situation requires a political solution," Lakhdar Brahimi, former UN envoy to Iraq and Afghanistan, told the newspaper.

Brahimi called Algeria to play its role in settling the Libyan crisis. "Algeria owes a lot to Libya which helped us during the Liberation War. And I'd like to say that Tunisia, Morocco and Algeria, particularly, are directly concerned and have to react."

The North African countries have to ask the UN to authorize them contributing to reach a political solution to the Libyan crisis, "and I'm sure the UN will not reject such a proposal," Brahimi said.

"The same authorization has to be demanded from both the Arab League and the African Union ... with the authorization of these three organizations, it would be possible to ask (Libyan leader Muammar) Gaddafi to step down with dignity, setting up a peace mission to help establishing reconciliation between the disputing parties, and then creating a second republic," he said.

Algerian Delegate Minister for Maghreb and African Affairs Abdelkader Messahel said last month that Algeria favors a comprehensive dialogue in Libya involving all the disputing parties, in order to reach a peaceful solution to the crisis.

He added that Algeria is in contact with all the Libyan parties in an attempt to settle the crisis.

Hama governor sacked: Syrian state TV

Scene from Friday's huge protest rally in Hama.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has removed the governor of Hama, one of the provinces at the heart of the ongoing protests, according to state television.

The sacking of Ahmad Khaled Abdel Aziz was announced on Saturday, a day after more than 400,000 people reportedly turned out in Hama city demanding the ouster of Assad and his government.

People filled the square around the central Clock Tower in what activists said was the biggest demonstration since the uprising began in March.

"Here we are, the germs of Syria," a local activist said, referring to Assad's speech in which he characterised the protesters as "germs" that Syria must inoculate itself against. "But we are big germs in huge numbers."

He said there was no visible security presence in Hama, only checkpoints at the entrances. "There's not even traffic police," he told Al Jazeera.

The opposition has deep roots in Hama, a city of 700,000. In 1982, under the rule of Hafez al-Assad, Bashar's father, the army stormed the city to crush a revolt by the Muslim Brotherhood, leaving about 20,000 people dead.

Syrian forces killed 28 civilians on Friday, a day of massive anti-regime rallies, the AFP reported.
Most of Friday's victims were killed in the Idlib province, where all week troops backed by tanks and armoured personnel carriers have swept through villages to crush dissent against Assad's government.
"Sixteen people were killed" in Idlib on Friday, Ammar Qorabi, the head of the National Organisation for Human Rights, told AFP on Saturday.

Another 10 people were killed when security forces opened fire to disperse protests in several cities, including eight in the central protest hub of Homs and two in the Damascus neighbourhood of Qadam.
More than 1,360 civilians have been killed in the government's crackdown against pro-democracy protests since mid-March, according to human rights groups.