Qaddafi Agrees to Accept Cease-Fire Plan, Start Talks, African Union Says
By - Apr 11, 2011 11:40 AM GMT+0530
A rebel fighter stands guard near the western gate of Ajdabiyah, near where Libyan army loyalist troops were bombed by NATO forces April 10, 2011. Photographer: Chris Hondros/Getty Images
Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi agreed to accept a peace plan that called for a cease-fire with rebels, the African Union said in statement.
Qaddafi agreed to “the immediate cessation of all hostilities,” and to negotiations “with the view to adopting and implementing the political reforms necessary for the elimination of the causes of the current crisis,” according to the statement. There was no mention of Qaddafi agreeing to step down and rebels have rejected any deal that would keep him in power.
South African President Jacob Zuma yesterday presented Qaddafi with the plan, which also calls for cooperation in delivering humanitarian aid and protecting foreign nationals in Libya. The AU delegation will meet today with rebel leaders in Benghazi, their stronghold in the east.
After almost two months of fighting, troops loyal to Qaddafi and rebels in the North African country, Africa’s largest oil exporter, have fought to a stalemate, with battles moving back and forth in a small area along the coast, and neither side able to take or hold territory for long.
“I don’t think anybody is going to be in a good position to mediate between these sides at this point,” said Andrew Terrill, a Middle East specialist at the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College. “People on the rebel side are totally committed to Qaddafi leaving power, and he won’t. They fear that any compromise with Qaddafi where he stays in power, he’ll put them in jail or have them executed, once he has the opportunity.”
‘Mostly Silent’
NATO air attacks against Qaddafi’s armor and supply routes appeared to have helped rebels push back loyalists from Ajdabiya yesterday, according to the New York Times, which reported from the city that Qaddafi’s artillery was “mostly silent” and rebels retook positions throughout the town.
Zuma yesterday called on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to end its bombardment to “give the cease-fire a chance,” the Associated Press reported.
Airstrikes blew up 11 tanks belonging to forces loyal to Qaddafi as they approached Ajdabiya yesterday, and 14 more were hit earlier on the outskirts of Misrata. NATO also said strikes left craters in the road used by Qaddafi to resupply troops shelling Ajdabiya.
NATO is enforcing United Nations resolutions that established a no-fly zone over Libya and called on member states to use force to protect civilians from attack by Qaddafi’s troops.
‘Fairly Effective’
“The airstrikes conducted by the NATO allies seem to have been fairly effective,” Terrill said. Still, “it looks like a stalemate,” with the rebels unable to conduct any sustained military operation on their own, he said. “You wonder if we will have a de facto partition, at least for a while.”
The Libyan government said yesterday it shot down two attack helicopters used by rebel forces over Brega, AP reported, citing Deputy Foreign Minister Khaled Amin. Pro-Qaddafi forces also launched a surprise attack on rebels in Ajdabiya, shelling the town and deploying soldiers on the streets, the British Broadcasting Corp. said. Eight rebels were killed, the BBC reported, citing unidentified doctors in the city.
“I don’t see the rebels getting a lot better to the point they’ll be able to take loyalist cities,” Terrill said. Neither side seems able to extend their supply lines or attacks much further into the other’s territory, suggesting Libya may ended up partitioned, he said.
That could allow the rebels time to train and equip, while Qaddafi will struggle under sanctions that could exhaust his cash, his munitions and his troops.
Struggling
The rebels have been struggling to move west from Benghazi and take and hold strategic towns including Ajdabiya, Brega and Ras Lanuf, Libya’s main oil terminal.
Oil output from Libya has dropped by about 1.3 million barrels a day to a “trickle,” the Paris-based International Energy Agency said last month. Oil production would still be less than a third of its pre-conflict level even if the rebels took control of the country’s oil fields, Nomura Holdings Inc. said in a report.
Crude oil climbed above $112 in New York for the first time in 30 months on April 8. Oil for May delivery rose $2.49 to $112.79 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the highest settlement since Sept. 22, 2008. Futures advanced 4.5 percent last week and are 32 percent higher than a year ago.
Syrian Ambush
In other developments in the Middle East, nine Syrian soldiers were killed when gunmen ambushed their vehicles in the coastal oil hub of Banias, where tanks were deployed to contain protests spreading across the country, the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency reported.
In Egypt, the general prosecutor summoned ousted president Hosni Mubarak and his two sons for investigations. In Gaza, Israeli and Hamas officials called for an end to four days of fighting that left 19 Palestinians dead, with each side appealing to the other to stop the shooting.
Foreign ministers of the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council meeting yesterday in the Saudi capital of Riyadh urged Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh to step down and called for a unity government. Saleh and the opposition declined to take part in the talks with GCC members Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
U.S. National Security Adviser Tom Donilon will visit Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates from today to April 13, meeting Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz and Abu Dhabi’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the White House said in a statement yesterday.
To contact the reporters on this story: Peter S. Green in New York at psgreen@bloomberg.net; Antony Sguazzin at asguazzin@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Andrew J. Barden at barden@bloomberg.net.
(source:bloomberg.com)
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