The Arab League: initiative to resolve the crisis

The Arab League has reinstated Saturday to Libya under the representation of the rebel National Transitional Council (CNT), after he was suspended from membership in February by the repression of demonstrations at the hands of security forces of the regime of Muammar Gaddafi .

This decision has produced an extraordinary meeting held at the headquarters of the organization in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, where the Libyan delegation was represented by Minister of Foreign Affairs of the CNT, Mahmoud Jibril. This involves recognizing the rebels as the legitimate representative of the Libyan people. The general secretary, Nabil al Araby, has called on Arab countries to release Libyan assets from banks as a sign of support for the CNT at the request of Jibril.

As reported by Reuters, the Arab League has also called on the international community and the Security Council of UN-Libyan thaw funds immediately. For his part, Jibril has urged his fellow Arabs to help Libya in the country's reconstruction and stabilization, as reported by the Qatari al-Jazeera network. Outside the headquarters of the Arab League, an individual has current Libyan flag replaced by the rebels. In March, the Arab League and supported the resolution by the Security Council of the UN that allowed foreign military intervention in Libya.

Libyan rebels say they want democracy

Libya – Libyan rebels want to install a parliamentary democracy in place of longtime ruler Moammar Gadhafi, one of their top leaders said Sunday, dismissing Western fears that their movement could be hijacked by Islamic extremists.
So far, the airstrikes have not been enough to give rebel fighters the upper hand over Gadhafi's superior troops, and Western officials are debating whether arming the rebels should be the next step.
Libya's opposition has said any extremists among their ranks would be few in number, and Gadhafi's own punishing campaigns crushed Islamic militants in the country years ago.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said Sunday that his country would neither arm the rebels nor send ground troops to Libya.
While acknowledging the importance of Islam in Libyan society, Ghoga insisted that "there is no place for an Islamic state in Libya."
"Will we accept an extremist government? Never," he said, dressed in a pinstriped blue suit with a pin of Libya's pre-Gadhafi flag on his lapel.
The rebels, backed by airstrikes, made incremental advances.
Sunday, rebels fired truck-mounted rocket launchers, then moved to avoid government counter-strikes, suggesting improving tactics and training.
The council, based in the rebels' de facto capital of Benghazi, was formed to represent the opposition in the eastern Libyan cities that shook off control of the central government in a series of popular uprisings last month.
Rebel forces — defected army units and armed civilians — have since seized much of Libya's eastern coast, but have been unable to push westward. Gadhafi's superior forces had been close to taking Benghazi before a U.N.-mandated no-fly zone and airstrikes began March 19.
Ghoga said the rebels were counting on numerous factors to push Gadhafi out: growing isolation, international military support, further defections among Gadhafi loyalists and improved organization of rebel troops.
The council rejects all negotiations with the Gadhafi regime, saying they don't trust it, making military pressure the current tactic of choice.
Ghoga said the working plan is for better organized rebel forces, supported by international airstrikes, to march on the cities of Sirte and Misrata, which lie on the coastal road to the capital, Tripoli.
Sirte, Gadhafi's tribal homeland, remains a well-armed bastion of support, and Gadhafi loyalists have besieged rebel fighters in Misrata's city center for weeks.
Medical officials said Saturday that shelling and sniper fire by government forces had killed 37 civilians in two days while incinerating the city's main stocks of flour and sugar.
Also Sunday, a Turkish ship carrying 250 wounded from Misrata was expected to dock in Benghazi, according to rebel officials.
The U.S. said it stopped flying strike missions in Libya as of Sunday, having passed the mission's military burden to NATO. NATO's on-scene commander can request American strikes, which Washington must approve.
The NATO flights include attack jets, AWACS surveillance aircraft, aerial refueling tankers, maritime patrol planes and other support aircraft.
Ghoga, 51, rose to prominence with the council's creation by acting as its official spokesman. Ghoga, whose father served as Libya's ambassador to Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Lebanon, studied law in Libya before earning his degree at the University of Damascus in Syria.
In Libya, he was involved in two high-profile — and ultimately unsuccessful — human rights cases.
"There was no movement on it because the principal actor was the Gadhafi regime and Gadhafi himself," he said.
The other case involved five Bulgarian nurses and a Palestinian doctor accused of intentionally infecting more than 400 Libyan children at a Benghazi hospital with HIV. Ghoga represented the children's families.

NATO : Airstrike Killed Libyan Civilians

NATO said Saturday it is investigating reports from Libya that rebels coalition airstrike hit a group of rebel fighters near the eastern oil city of Brega, killing at least three of them.


Witnesses said someone in the group had fired anti-aircraft heavy weapons into the air before the strike Friday night, although it is unclear whether the weapons were fired by the rebels or troops celebrate loyal to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi who had infiltrated the group.




French news agency AFP, said the rebels had declared victory in the battle for Brega on Saturday after heavy fighting. On Friday, opposition leaders in the rebel stronghold east of Benghazi propose a truce. Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, a former Libyan justice minister, said government forces must first withdraw from the cities they now control while those who end their siege under rebel control. Bids truce was immediately rejected by the government Gadhafi as "tricks." A government spokesman, Ibrahim Mussa, told reporters in the capital, Tripoli, demanding the rebels' is "impossible" and "never offered peace."


Libyan government has labeled the Western coalition air strikes continue to support the rebels as a "crime against humanity." 

Gaddafi troops reverse Libyan rebel advance

TRIPOLI (Reuters) – Muammar Gaddafi's better armed and organized troops reversed the westward charge of rebels and world powers meeting in London piled pressure on the Libyan leader to end his 41-year rule.
British Prime Minister David Cameron, opening the London conference, accused Libyan troops of "murderous attacks," while U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said military strikes would press on until Gaddafi loyalists ceased violence.
"All of us must continue to increase the pressure on and deepen the isolation of the Gaddafi regime through other means as well," Clinton said after the London talks finished.
"This includes a unified front of political and diplomatic pressure that makes clear to Gaddafi that he must go," she said.
The United States is scaling back to a "supporting role" to let NATO take full command from U.S. forces on Wednesday, but air strikes by U.S., French and British planes remain key to smashing Gaddafi's armor and facilitating rebel advances.
It took five days of allied air strikes to pulverize Libyan government tanks around the town of Ajdabiyah before Gaddafi's troops fled and the rebels rushed in and began their 300-km (200-mile), two-day dash across the desert to within 80 km (50 miles) of the Gaddafi loyalist stronghold of Sirte.
But the rebel pick-up truck cavalcade was first ambushed, then outflanked by Gaddafi troops. The advance stopped and government forces retook the small town of Nawfaliyah, 120 km (75 miles) east of Sirte.
"The Gaddafi guys hit us with Grads (rockets) and they came round our flanks," Ashraf Mohammed, a 28-year-old rebel wearing a bandolier of bullets, told a Reuters reporter at the front.
The sporadic thud of heavy weapons could be heard as dozens of civilian cars sped eastwards away from the fight.
Later, a hail of machinegun and rocket fire hit rebel positions. As the onslaught began, rebels leapt behind sand dunes to fire back. After a few minutes they gave up, jumped into their pick-up trucks and sped off back toward the town of Bin Jawad. Shells landed near the road as they retreated.
A rebel spokeswoman in the main rebel stronghold of Benghazi said that the front line was now just west of Bin Jawad, 25 km (15 miles) east of Nawfaliyah.
REBELS ON THE RUN
Without air strikes it appears the rebels are not able to make advances or even hold ground.
Reports that some Nawfaliyah residents had fought alongside government troops are an ominous sign for world powers hoping for a swift end to Gaddafi's rule.
Britain said the international partners meeting in London agreed to continue their military mission until Gaddafi complied with all terms of a U.N. resolution to protect civilians.
They also agreed to set up a contact group, including Arab states, to give political guidance for the response to the war and coordinate long-term support to Libya. The Gulf Arab state of Qatar agreed to convene a first meeting as soon as possible.
Gaddafi accused Western powers of massacres of Libyan civilians in alliance with rebels he said were al Qaeda members.
"Stop your brutal and unjust attack on our country ... Hundreds of Libyans are being killed because of this bombardment. Massacres are being mercilessly committed against the Libyan people," he said in a letter to world leaders.
"We are a people united behind the leadership of the revolution, facing the terrorism of al Qaeda on the one hand and on the other hand terrorism by NATO, which now directly supports al Qaeda," Libya's official news agency quoted him as saying.
The rebels deny any al Qaeda links and on Tuesday promised free and fair elections if Gaddafi is forced from power.
Admiral James Stavridis, head of U.S. European Command, told the U.S. Senate there was no indication of any "significant al Qaeda presence or any other terrorist presence."
Both Britain and Italy suggested Gaddafi might be allowed to go into exile to bring a quick end to the six-week civil war, but the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice said there was no evidence the Libyan leader was prepared to leave.
NO REGIME CHANGE MISSION
Clinton met the opposition Libyan National Council envoy Mahmoud Jebril before the London talks. A senior U.S. official said the two could discuss releasing $33 billion in frozen Libyan assets to the opposition.
Clinton said coalition military strikes would continue until Gaddafi fully complies with U.N. demands to cease violence against civilians and pull forces out of occupied cities.
"All of us must continue to increase the pressure on and deepen the isolation of the Gaddafi regime through other means as well," Clinton told the London conference.
"This includes a unified front of political and diplomatic pressure that makes clear to Gaddafi that he must go."
U.S. President Barack Obama once again ruled out sending ground troops to Libya or directly bringing about regime change by toppling Gaddafi.
"To be blunt, we went down that road in Iraq," Obama said in a televised address before the conference.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague said the London conference had not discussed arming the rebels, but U.S. officials were not ruling it out, believing it to be permitted by U.N. Security Council Resolution 1973 calling for the protection of Libyan civilians from Gaddafi's forces.
"We have not made that decision, but we've not certainly ruled that out," Rice told CBS's "The Early Show." An Italian diplomatic source said it would require a new U.N. resolution.
Rice said the United States would maintain financial and diplomatic pressure on Libya until Gaddafi leaves.
In western Libya, rebels and forces loyal to Gaddafi both claimed control over parts of Misrata, Libya's third city which has been besieged by government forces for more than a month.
Libyan state television said thousands of people were taking part in a march in support of Gaddafi in Misrata, which it said had been "cleansed of armed terrorist gangs." It was the third time the channel said Misrata had been recaptured from rebels.
A rebel spokesman said Gaddafi forces launched another attempt to seize control of Misrata in the city
Government troops "tried an hour ago to get into the town through the eastern gate. The youths are trying to push them back. Fighting is still taking place now. Random bombardment is continuing," the spokesman, called Sami, told Reuters by telephone from the city. "Eight civilians were killed and several others wounded last night."
"The humanitarian situation is catastrophic. There is a shortage of food and medicine. The hospital is no longer able to deal with the situation," the rebel spokesman said.
"We call for urgent help to protect civilians and improve the humanitarian situation."
(Additional reporting by Angus MacSwan, Alexander Dziadosz, Edmund Blair, Maria Golovnina, Michael Georgy, Ibon Villelabeitia, Lamine Chikhi, Hamid Ould Ahmed, Marie-Louise Gumuchian, Andrew Quinn and David Brunnstrom; Writing by Jon Hemming and Kevin Liffey; Editing by Peter Millership)

 Source: news.yahoo.com