Zimpapers Logo

assa-ulting the rebel stronghold of Benghazi on Saturday afternoon and overnight.
Britain and the US fired over 120 tomahawk cruise missiles at Libyan air defence systems overnight and air patrols from the three nations were on station over Libya yesterday enforcing a no-fly zone.
Libya said 64 civilians had been killed in the air and missile strikes, deaths which have caused the Arab League and Russia to condemn the strikes and call for only enforcement of the no-fly zone.
The African Union’s panel on Libya yesterday called for an “immediate stop” to all attacks after the United States, France and Britain launched military action against Gaddafi’s forces.
After a more than four-hour meeting in the Mauritanian capital, the body also asked Libyan authorities to ensure “humanitarian aid to those in need,” as well as the “protection of foreigners, including African expatriates living in Libya.”
It underscored the need for “necessary political reforms to eliminate the causes of the prese-nt crisis.”
The AU early this month said the situation in Libya was not ripe for undue Western interfere-nce, hence the need to back Gaddafi.
It took exception to interference by the West-ern countries pledging to send a high-level panel of five Heads of State – supported by experts – to recommend an African position and steps to be taken.
Saturday’s first round of attacks by aircraft and cruise missiles prompted a defiant Gaddafi to warn of a long war in the Mediterranean “battlefield”.
Gaddafi yesterday said all Libyans were ar-med and ready to fight until victory against what he branded “barbaric aggression.”
“We promise you a long, drawn-out war with no limits,” he said, speaking on state television for a second straight day without appearing on came-ra.
The leaders of Britain, France and the United States will “fall like Hitler . . . Mussolini,” he warned.
“America, France, or Britain, the Christians that are in a pact against us today, they will not enjoy our oil,” he said.
“We do not have to retreat from the battlefield because we are defending our land and our dignity.”
He vowed retaliatory strikes on military and civilian targets in the Mediterranean, which he said had been turned into a “real battlefield.”
Dissenting voices arose yesterday as the scale and method of what the West is calling “Operation Odyssey Dawn” became apparent, including from the Arab League which had backed the no-fly zone.
Arab League chief Amr Moussa called for an emergency meeting of the group of 22 states to discuss Libya.
He requested a report into the bombardment which he said had “led to the deaths and injuries of many Libyan civilians”.
“What is happening in Libya differs from the aim of imposing a no-fly zone, and what we want is the protection of civilians and not the bombardment of more civilians,” Egypt’s official state news agency quoted Moussa as saying.
Arab backing for a no-fly zone provided crucial underpinning for the passage of the UN Security Council resolution last week that paved the way for Western action.
Russia, which abstained in Thursday’s Security Council vote instead of using its veto, called for an end to “indiscriminate use of force” by the coalition, citing the casualties reported by Tripoli.
Foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said the raids had included attacks on non-military targets, and had damaged roads, bridges and a cardiology centre.

“We proceed from the inadmissibility of using the Resolution 1973 mandate… for ends that clearly overstep its framework, which stipulates only measures to protect the civilian population,” he said.
China’s Foreign Ministry yesterday expressed regret over the multinational military strike against Libya, saying that it did not agree with resorting to force in international relations.
“China has noticed the latest development in Libya and regrets the military strike against Libya,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said.
China, as always, does not agree with the use of force in international relations, Jiang said, when asked to comment on the strike carried out by western forces early yesterday.
China believes that the tenet and principles of the United Nations Charter and relevant international laws should be adhered to, and Libya’s sovereignty, independence, unification and territory integrity should be respected, she said.
“We hope stability could be restored in Libya as soon as possible so as to avoid more civilian casualties caused by the escalation of military conflicts,” she said.
The western forces say the UN Security Council resolution they are implementing allows them to take action to protect civilians, hence the French attacks on the armoured columns that were attacking Benghazi and the US and British attacks on airfields.
The British, French and Americans were being joined yesterday by planes from Denmark, Norway, Spain, Italy, Canada and two Arab countries, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates with Denmark launching four planes from an Italian base late yesterday afternoon on its first mission. Italy has opened up to seven airfields for the coalition while French forces fly from Corsica.
Qatar’s Prime Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem al-Thani earlier defended Doha’s declared participation in the strikes on a fellow Arab state, saying the sole aim was to “stop the bloodbath.”
The French aircraft carrier the Charles de Gaulle, carrying 20 warplanes, is heading towards Libya. The United States does not have a carrier in the Mediterranean and Britain decommissioned its last carrier just over a week ago.
While his eastern forces fled from the outskirts of Benghazi in the face of the allied air attacks, Gaddafi sent tanks into Misrata, the last rebel city in western Libya. Among the densely packed houses they were less vulnerable to attack from the air without the risk of killing innocent civilians.
Reports say four tanks were in the city centre.
The western forces prepared yesterday for new strikes against Libya claiming they were enforcing a UN resolution aimed at halting Gaddafi’s attacks on civilians in suppressing a month-long uprising.
Western warplanes were converging on Italy’s air bases to join the campaign, while four Danish F-16 fighters took off yesterday from the Sigonella air base for Libyan airspace, Denmark’s public radio said, quoting an eyewitness reporter.
Aircraft from the United Arab Emirates were also due at the Decimomannu air force base on the Italian island of Sardinia, which is already hosting four Spanish F-18 fighters that arrived on Saturday. Italian Defence Minister Ignazio La Russa said Rome had assigned eight combat aircraft for the operation and they can be used “at any time.”
And British Defence Secretary Liam Fox said Typhoon fighters and Tornado strike aircraft would fly this weekend to the Gioia del Colle base in southern Italy.
The intervention is the biggest against an Arab country since the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Withdrawal of Arab support would make it much harder to pursue what some defence analysts say could in any case be a difficult, open-ended campaign with an uncertain outcome.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon said Gaddafi was now feeling the “unified will” of the international community. – Reuters, AFP, Xinhua.