Where's Muammar Gaddafi ? - After an extraordinary night in which Muammar Gaddafi's 42-year iron grip on power seemed to crumble, there were fierce fighting in parts of Tripoli between the Libyan leader's die-hard supporters, and the thousands of rebel fighters who had poured into the city just 12 hours before.
With crowds pouring into the streets to celebrate the end of Gaddafi's autocratic rule, the man himself was nowhere to be found - ostensibly hiding out as he contemplated any option ahead aside from arrest and an international trial.
So dizzyingly fast have events moved that few people - whether they be Libya's apparent new leaders, or Western officials - have had time to contemplate what comes next. The fears in both Libya and Western capitals is that Libya could replay the chaos which ensued in Iraq after Saddam Hussein's ouster in 2003, with a vicious insurgency born from the old regime. Reporters in Tripoli on Monday reported hearing heavy gunfire in the city's center, and rebel officials said they believed about 20% of the city of 2 million remained in the control of Gaddafi loyalists; those appeared to include snipers who were perched atop buildings.
Alexandre Meneghini - A woman walks on a street carrying a pre-Gadhafi's flag during the celebrations of the capture in Tripoli of his son and one-time heir apparent, Seif al-Islam, at the rebel-held town of
On Monday morning British Prime Minister David Cameron raced back from his vacation in Cornwall and summoned his his national security team to discuss the astonishing events in Tripoli. He said that frozen Libyan assets would soon be released to help the country's rebels establish order, claiming that Gaddafi's regime was "falling apart and in full retreat."
The Libyan rebels' charge d'affaires in London Mahmud Nacue told reporters on Monday morning that the fighters were scouring Tripoli to find Gaddafi. "The fighters will turn over every stone to find him and arrest him and to put him in court," he said, stressing that they opposed any vengeance killings by rebels of Gaddafi or his officials. "They arrested two of his sons, Saif al-Islam and Mohammad, and they are treating them in a good manner," Nacue said. "We think we will do our best to handle everything in a peaceful way." Nacua also said that opposition forces control 95% of the city.
Though Gaddafi remained in hiding on Monday morning (Assistant Secretary of State Jeffrey Feltman acknowledged on ABC's Good Morning America that U.S. officials don't know his whereabouts) his regime was finally over from late Sunday night, when thousands of people poured into the streets of the capital Tripoli late Sunday night, firing guns in the air and cheering a column of rebel pick-up trucks which converged on the city, apparently meeting no resistance from regime forces. "We are coming for you, frizz-head!" the Associated Press reported some rebel fighters as screaming, mocking Gaddafi to the delight of residents.
Overnight, Gaddafi made a last-ditch plea for his supporters to defend Tripoli, telling them to "pick up your weapons, there should be no fear." Speaking from an unknown hiding place, the audio address lasted just about one minute, suggesting that the leader might be in an insecure location. Shortly after 1 a.m. Tripoli time Gaddafi was back on television for the fourth time in 24 hours, pleading for rural tribal leaders to march on Tripoli to fight the rebels. Sounding enraged, he ranted against the rebel fighters and NATO alike. "If Tripoli was to burn like Baghdad, why would you allow this to happen?" he said. He claimed there were other assets at his command. "The women who are trained in weapons might also fight."
But he may no longer be able to call upon his sons. The opposition representative in London Gumal Gamaty claimed late Sunday night that rebel fighters had arrested Gaddafi's best-known offspring Saif al-Islam. Later reports had two other Gaddafi sons, Saadi and Mohammed, had been taken into custody. "Saif has been captured and held in a safe place," he said on Sky News. Gamaty dismissed warnings of revenge killings, saying: "Libyan people are all united to get rid of tyranny, this dark era of 42 years.... We are just looking forward to a getting a fresh start."
The apparent last gasp of Gaddafi's power appeared to happen with breathless speed, as his loyalists seemingly melted away in the dark. That defied earlier predictions that the rebels - if they made it into the capital - would likely need to fight block by block, against die-hard Gaddafi supporters with nothing left little to lose.
That has not happened. Around 11.30 p.m., as ecstatic crowds of residents filled the roads leading to central Tripoli, a rebel fighter with his head wrapped in a keffiyeh said the opposition forces were cautiously optimistic that the violence they had expected to confront in Tripoli might not materialize. "We were expecting resistance," he told a Sky News correspondent live on television, as they sat stuck in a traffic jam of celebrating residents. A few minutes later came news that the brigade which had protected Gaddafi through months of heavy combat had laid down their weapons and surrendered. "All of us are happy because Gaddafi is leaving soon."
The rebel campaign had hugely accelerated since Friday, when opposition fighters seized the key oil-refinery city of Zawiyah just 46 kilometers (28 miles) from central Tripoli, leaving Gaddafi and his supporters with no reliable source of refined fuel - essential to continuing the war. Even so, analysts with considerable Tripoli experience had predicted only hours earlier that Gaddafi's most fervent supporters would likely put up a bitter fight in defense of their last stronghold, particularly as the leader's only apparent alternative was a grim war-crimes trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. "If there's determined resistance it could be very difficult," Richard Dalton, a former British ambassador to Tripoli, said on Sunday afternoon.
But suffering from both exhaustion and political isolation, Gaddafi's supporters have apparently dwindled over the past few days, perhaps having finally realized that they were out of options. Last March, NATO members voted to launch a bombing campaign on Gaddafi's forces, ostensibly to protect rebels who were then virtually under siege in their eastern headquarters of Benghazi. At the time, NATO commanders envisioned a short campaign in which Gaddafi's forces would likely crumble quickly. Instead, Gaddafi held out far longer than was predicted, by using billions of dollars and considerable oil resources at hand, harnessing his supporters and a few key tribal leaders, and employing mercenaries, while also being helped by the rebels' inexperience and disorganization.
Gaddafi's spokesman Moussa Ibrahim, looking weary and somber, went on television near midnight warning that there could be a massacre of civilians in Tripoli. "We are here to sincerely as always plea for an immediate ceasefire," Ibrahim said. Earlier Sunday, British Foreign Office officials said that NATO attacks had been critical during the past few days in clearing the rebels' way into Tripoli. By midnight Sunday, the effects of those attacks were clear, as wild carnival-style scenes erupted in Tripoli.
Nonetheless, there are potential perils - especially as there appeared little chance left of peace talks between rebel leaders and Gaddafi. NATO spokeswoman Qana Lungescu said on CNN at midnight Sunday Tripoli time that while the coalition's forces had paved the way towards Gaddafi's downfall, others now needed to negotiate a transition to democracy. "It is for the United Nations and the contact group to negotiate a political solution to this conflict," she said.
Inside Tripoli's Rixos Hotel, where foreign journalists have been stationed during the six-month conflict, spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said regime forces were fighting rebels in Tripoli, and "defeating them in many neighborhoods." He blamed the breakdown in peace talks on NATO and Western leaders, who had placed conditions on negotiations, he said. "You cannot condition peace," Ibrahim told reporters, while crowds poured into the streets."You need to sit down and talk and then discuss everything." He said about 1,300 people had been killed in Tripoli, and that "the hospitals cannot cope." Ibrahim's call for ceasefire talks appeared to come at the last moment - and perhaps, too late.
With foreign reporters still in lockdown mode within Tripoli, and those journalists traveling with the rebels not yet inside the city, the channel to watch as the extraordinary end-game played out was Sky News, Rupert Murdoch's British-based 24-hour network. Perched atop a pick-up truck in the column of vehicles headed into central Tripoli, correspondent Alex Crawford was live on television for more than two hours, dressed in a bullet-proof helmet and vest, using a remote device which allows live television coverage from anywhere with a satellite signal. Crawford, who had been trapped for days inside Zawiyah during a battle between rebels and Gaddafi forces last March, said she was astonished at the scenes around her. "People are hugging these rebels, thanking them. For heaven's sake, they are even thanking us, and we are just riding along with them," she said on air, as the throngs crowded around the vehicles. ( time.com )
With crowds pouring into the streets to celebrate the end of Gaddafi's autocratic rule, the man himself was nowhere to be found - ostensibly hiding out as he contemplated any option ahead aside from arrest and an international trial.
So dizzyingly fast have events moved that few people - whether they be Libya's apparent new leaders, or Western officials - have had time to contemplate what comes next. The fears in both Libya and Western capitals is that Libya could replay the chaos which ensued in Iraq after Saddam Hussein's ouster in 2003, with a vicious insurgency born from the old regime. Reporters in Tripoli on Monday reported hearing heavy gunfire in the city's center, and rebel officials said they believed about 20% of the city of 2 million remained in the control of Gaddafi loyalists; those appeared to include snipers who were perched atop buildings.
Alexandre Meneghini - A woman walks on a street carrying a pre-Gadhafi's flag during the celebrations of the capture in Tripoli of his son and one-time heir apparent, Seif al-Islam, at the rebel-held town of
On Monday morning British Prime Minister David Cameron raced back from his vacation in Cornwall and summoned his his national security team to discuss the astonishing events in Tripoli. He said that frozen Libyan assets would soon be released to help the country's rebels establish order, claiming that Gaddafi's regime was "falling apart and in full retreat."
The Libyan rebels' charge d'affaires in London Mahmud Nacue told reporters on Monday morning that the fighters were scouring Tripoli to find Gaddafi. "The fighters will turn over every stone to find him and arrest him and to put him in court," he said, stressing that they opposed any vengeance killings by rebels of Gaddafi or his officials. "They arrested two of his sons, Saif al-Islam and Mohammad, and they are treating them in a good manner," Nacue said. "We think we will do our best to handle everything in a peaceful way." Nacua also said that opposition forces control 95% of the city.
Though Gaddafi remained in hiding on Monday morning (Assistant Secretary of State Jeffrey Feltman acknowledged on ABC's Good Morning America that U.S. officials don't know his whereabouts) his regime was finally over from late Sunday night, when thousands of people poured into the streets of the capital Tripoli late Sunday night, firing guns in the air and cheering a column of rebel pick-up trucks which converged on the city, apparently meeting no resistance from regime forces. "We are coming for you, frizz-head!" the Associated Press reported some rebel fighters as screaming, mocking Gaddafi to the delight of residents.
Overnight, Gaddafi made a last-ditch plea for his supporters to defend Tripoli, telling them to "pick up your weapons, there should be no fear." Speaking from an unknown hiding place, the audio address lasted just about one minute, suggesting that the leader might be in an insecure location. Shortly after 1 a.m. Tripoli time Gaddafi was back on television for the fourth time in 24 hours, pleading for rural tribal leaders to march on Tripoli to fight the rebels. Sounding enraged, he ranted against the rebel fighters and NATO alike. "If Tripoli was to burn like Baghdad, why would you allow this to happen?" he said. He claimed there were other assets at his command. "The women who are trained in weapons might also fight."
But he may no longer be able to call upon his sons. The opposition representative in London Gumal Gamaty claimed late Sunday night that rebel fighters had arrested Gaddafi's best-known offspring Saif al-Islam. Later reports had two other Gaddafi sons, Saadi and Mohammed, had been taken into custody. "Saif has been captured and held in a safe place," he said on Sky News. Gamaty dismissed warnings of revenge killings, saying: "Libyan people are all united to get rid of tyranny, this dark era of 42 years.... We are just looking forward to a getting a fresh start."
The apparent last gasp of Gaddafi's power appeared to happen with breathless speed, as his loyalists seemingly melted away in the dark. That defied earlier predictions that the rebels - if they made it into the capital - would likely need to fight block by block, against die-hard Gaddafi supporters with nothing left little to lose.
That has not happened. Around 11.30 p.m., as ecstatic crowds of residents filled the roads leading to central Tripoli, a rebel fighter with his head wrapped in a keffiyeh said the opposition forces were cautiously optimistic that the violence they had expected to confront in Tripoli might not materialize. "We were expecting resistance," he told a Sky News correspondent live on television, as they sat stuck in a traffic jam of celebrating residents. A few minutes later came news that the brigade which had protected Gaddafi through months of heavy combat had laid down their weapons and surrendered. "All of us are happy because Gaddafi is leaving soon."
The rebel campaign had hugely accelerated since Friday, when opposition fighters seized the key oil-refinery city of Zawiyah just 46 kilometers (28 miles) from central Tripoli, leaving Gaddafi and his supporters with no reliable source of refined fuel - essential to continuing the war. Even so, analysts with considerable Tripoli experience had predicted only hours earlier that Gaddafi's most fervent supporters would likely put up a bitter fight in defense of their last stronghold, particularly as the leader's only apparent alternative was a grim war-crimes trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague. "If there's determined resistance it could be very difficult," Richard Dalton, a former British ambassador to Tripoli, said on Sunday afternoon.
But suffering from both exhaustion and political isolation, Gaddafi's supporters have apparently dwindled over the past few days, perhaps having finally realized that they were out of options. Last March, NATO members voted to launch a bombing campaign on Gaddafi's forces, ostensibly to protect rebels who were then virtually under siege in their eastern headquarters of Benghazi. At the time, NATO commanders envisioned a short campaign in which Gaddafi's forces would likely crumble quickly. Instead, Gaddafi held out far longer than was predicted, by using billions of dollars and considerable oil resources at hand, harnessing his supporters and a few key tribal leaders, and employing mercenaries, while also being helped by the rebels' inexperience and disorganization.
Gaddafi's spokesman Moussa Ibrahim, looking weary and somber, went on television near midnight warning that there could be a massacre of civilians in Tripoli. "We are here to sincerely as always plea for an immediate ceasefire," Ibrahim said. Earlier Sunday, British Foreign Office officials said that NATO attacks had been critical during the past few days in clearing the rebels' way into Tripoli. By midnight Sunday, the effects of those attacks were clear, as wild carnival-style scenes erupted in Tripoli.
Nonetheless, there are potential perils - especially as there appeared little chance left of peace talks between rebel leaders and Gaddafi. NATO spokeswoman Qana Lungescu said on CNN at midnight Sunday Tripoli time that while the coalition's forces had paved the way towards Gaddafi's downfall, others now needed to negotiate a transition to democracy. "It is for the United Nations and the contact group to negotiate a political solution to this conflict," she said.
Inside Tripoli's Rixos Hotel, where foreign journalists have been stationed during the six-month conflict, spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said regime forces were fighting rebels in Tripoli, and "defeating them in many neighborhoods." He blamed the breakdown in peace talks on NATO and Western leaders, who had placed conditions on negotiations, he said. "You cannot condition peace," Ibrahim told reporters, while crowds poured into the streets."You need to sit down and talk and then discuss everything." He said about 1,300 people had been killed in Tripoli, and that "the hospitals cannot cope." Ibrahim's call for ceasefire talks appeared to come at the last moment - and perhaps, too late.
With foreign reporters still in lockdown mode within Tripoli, and those journalists traveling with the rebels not yet inside the city, the channel to watch as the extraordinary end-game played out was Sky News, Rupert Murdoch's British-based 24-hour network. Perched atop a pick-up truck in the column of vehicles headed into central Tripoli, correspondent Alex Crawford was live on television for more than two hours, dressed in a bullet-proof helmet and vest, using a remote device which allows live television coverage from anywhere with a satellite signal. Crawford, who had been trapped for days inside Zawiyah during a battle between rebels and Gaddafi forces last March, said she was astonished at the scenes around her. "People are hugging these rebels, thanking them. For heaven's sake, they are even thanking us, and we are just riding along with them," she said on air, as the throngs crowded around the vehicles. ( time.com )
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