Son of Qaddafi Killed in NATO Airstrike
Louafi Larbi/Reuters
A guided government tour on Saturday showed a missile from a coalition airstrike in the house of Saif al-Arab el-Qaddafi, the youngest son of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, in Tripoli.
By KAREEM FAHIM and C. J. CHIVERS
Published: April 30, 2011
BENGHAZI, Libya — Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi survived a NATO airstrike in Tripoli late Saturday night that killed his youngest son and three of the colonel’s grandchildren, a Libyan government spokesman announced early Sunday.
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Bryan Denton for The New York Times
Rebels and citizens of Misurata celebrated late Saturday after hearing reports that Seif al-Arab el-Qaddafi was killed in a NATO airstrike.
“Tonight and only a short time ago, the Western crusader aggression against the Libyan nation continued and proved again that it has no moral foundation, no legal foundation and no political foundation,” said Moussa Ibrahim, the government spokesman. “The attack resulted in the martyrdom of brother Seif al-Arab Muammar el-Qaddafi, 29 years old, and three of the leader’s grandchildren.”
Mr. Ibrahim said that Colonel Qaddafi and his wife, who were in the son’s house along with “friends and relatives,” were not wounded in the attack.
The son who was said to be killed has a lower profile than some of Colonel Qaddafi’s other children. Western officials say he made his home in Munich most of the time, and did not seem to play as much of a role in Libya’s everyday affairs as some of his older siblings (including one with a similar name, Seif al-Islam el-Qaddafi).
Footage broadcast on the satellite channel Al Jazeerashowed the wreckage of the house, including a wall with an enormous hole and shattered concrete. There was no immediate reaction from NATO or independent confirmation of the attack.
Celebratory gunfire and explosions could be heard throughout Benghazi, the de facto rebel capital in eastern Libya, and Misurata, a western city that Colonel Qaddafi’s forces have besieged for months. Tracer fire and fireworks lit up the sky over Benghazi.
Just hours before, NATO officials had rejected an offer by Colonel Qaddafi to call a cease-fire and negotiate as false. The proposal was delivered amid a rambling and often defiant speech, televised by Libyan state media, in which Colonel Qaddafi insisted he would never leave Libya.
“Come France, Italy, U.K., America, come, we’ll negotiate with you,” Colonel Qaddafi said. “You lie and say I’m killing my own people. Show us the bodies.”
The speech, which was broadcast about 2:30 a.m. Saturday, was the latest in a series of proclamations from the Libyan leader, and it was made as NATO forces said they would broaden their list of targets to include palaces, communication centers and other administrative buildings that Colonel Qaddafi relies on to maintain power.
NATO and the rebels immediately rejected the call for a cease-fire, which they described as a disingenuous ploy.
The allies’ attacks earlier Saturday included a strike on a government complex in Tripoli, the capital, that reporters were told housed a commission for women and children along with parliamentary staff offices, The Associated Press said. A television tower nearby was undamaged, though the broadcast went dark three times during the speech, The A.P. reported.
Colonel Qaddafi repeated his assertions that the rebels belonged to Al Qaeda or were terrorists and mercenaries, even as he appealed to them to lay down their weapons. Looking relaxed as he sat behind a desk, and gazing at someone or something off camera, he lost his train of thought several times and referred to notes in his hand.
“Qaddafi doesn’t have the power, he doesn’t have the position to leave,” he said of himself. ”With my rifle, I will fight for my country.”
An opposition spokesman in Benghazi, Jalal al-Gallal, dismissed Colonel Qaddafi’s offers as “public relations for the world.”
“We know he’s not being genuine,” Mr. Gallal said. “He’s not once offered anything and followed through.”
A NATO official in Brussels said that the Libyan authorities had announced cease-fires several times, only to continue attacks on cities and civilians.
“We need to see actions, not words,” the official told Reuters.
There were few signs that he intended to ease the military pressure on his opponents. A rebel military spokesman said that Qaddafi forces had begun an assault early Saturday on the eastern towns of Jalu and Awjilah, about 120 miles south of the city of Ajdabiya, attacking in trucks mounted with antiaircraft guns and Grad rockets.
The spokesman, Col. Ahmed Omar Bani, said 5 civilians had been killed in the fighting and 10 had been wounded.
The attack, which could not immediately be confirmed, seemed to follow an emerging pattern in the conflict in which the rebels have stepped up their resistance in the west — in the Nefusa mountain region, along the Tunisian border and in the strategic port city of Misurata. At the same time, Colonel Qaddafi’s forces have made harassing raids on poorly defended towns near the eastern oil fields in recent weeks, straining, at times, efforts by the rebels to keep producing oil.
A stalemate persisted on the country’s main coastal road near the city of Brega, which was the site of intense fighting for weeks. Colonel Bani said there had been few skirmishes over the past two weeks on the front there, which lies between Brega and Ajdabiya, about 45 miles to the east.
He framed the standoff as a strategic choice. “We are defending Ajdabiya,” he said. “They fire sporadically to remind us they are there.”
The rebels have said that in the coming days they will appoint a new defense minister to replace Omar al-Hariri, a former political prisoner who occupied a largely ceremonial role in the rebels’ transitional government. They were hoping that the appointment of a civilian would impose a measure of organization on an inexperienced fighting force that has been plagued by setbacks on the eastern front and infighting in its upper ranks.
Fighting continued for Misurata, the rebel stronghold in the west that has been besieged by Qaddafi forces for two months. Early Saturday, large explosions on the outskirts shook the coastal city. Rebels later said they were NATO airstrikes.
By 9 a.m., the Qaddafi forces, which remained outside the city, were shelling and firing ground-to-ground rockets into the city, both near its southern front and later with barrages on civilian neighborhoods near the port. One barrage alone killed five rebel fighters, two by one rocket explosion and three others as they tried to assist their fallen friends, a rebel said as the bodies were taken for burial.
NATO was also clearing the harbor of mines, which it said pro-Qaddafi forces were spotted laying on Friday. The mines temporarily closed the harbor, disrupting humanitarian aid ships.
Fighting continued near the airport, south of Misurata, which Qaddafi forces still controlled. Shelling continued in the afternoon, with explosions reverberating across the city.
The Qaddafi forces’ shelling of Misurata resumed at about 10:30 p.m. Explosions shook the city as rockets or artillery rounds struck the Ras Altotah neighborhood. At least 15 people were wounded, 6 fatally. Among the dead was an old man who was struck by shrapnel on his right side and a young father of four children.
The young man’s children and his wife were all wounded. They huddled at a Red Crescent clinic, unaware he was dead. “It is not easy to tell them,” said Absalom Essid, who stood at the door to the room where the dead man’s wife was being treated.
At another clinic, the wounded included a baby girl who appeared to be about 10 months old and suffered a fractured leg. She was teary-eyed with a pacifier in her mouth as doctors prepared to set the bone
(source:nytimes.com)
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