Sarkozy Says Gadhafi Must Go, State Violence Can't Go Unpunished
Loyalists of Moammar Gadhafi killed several people in shooting that was spreading through Tripoli on Friday as French President Nicolas Sarkozy said the embattled Libyan leader "must go."
And as protesters against Gadhafi's iron-fisted four-decade rule braved deadly gunfire in several parts of the capital, opponents braced for a fightback by a regime that has suffered yet more defections.
Sarkozy said "Mr. Gadhafi must go," becoming the first world leader to demand the ouster of the 68-year-old former army colonel.
"The systematic violence against the Libyan people is unacceptable and will be the subject of investigations and sanctions," he added at a news conference in Ankara with Turkish counterpart Abdullah Gul.
Earlier Friday, France said it did not see the need for NATO's decision making body to meet over the ongoing deadly anti-regime protests in Libya despite the bloc's leader having called such a meeting.
"It's up to NATO's secretary general (Anders Fogh Rasmussen) to decide on a meeting," foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero told journalists.
"France, which is already bringing the matter before the U.N. Security Council, does not see the need for a meeting of NATO's council on Libya."
Rasmussen has convened an emergency meeting of the North Atlantic Council, the 28-nation alliance's decision-making body, for later Friday in Brussels.
NATO ambassadors will discuss "possible options" and exchange information on the "fast-moving situation," Rasmussen told reporters in Hungary where he was meeting EU defense ministers to discuss evacuation efforts from Libya.
Governments worldwide have been scrambling to evacuate tens of thousands of citizens stranded in Libya amid fears that a revolt against Gadhafi's regime will descend into all-out civil war.
Meanwhile, outraged Western governments scrambled to craft a collective response to the bloody crackdown in the oil-rich North African state, including possible sanctions against Gadhafi and his lieutenants and a freeze on assets they are believed to have salted away abroad.
But they were constrained by fears of reprisals against their people still stranded amid what escaping expatriates described as hellish scenes as evacuation efforts dragged on into the 11th day of the crisis.
In Tripoli, security forces opened fire indiscriminately on worshippers leaving prayers, desperate to prevent any new protests on the weekly Muslim day of rest, residents told Agence France Presse by telephone.
Two people were killed in the Fashlum neighborhood, several more in Sug al-Jomaa, witnesses said.
Both are eastern suburbs where security forces had opened fire on previous days, but sustained gunfire was also reported in the western district of Ghut Ashaal.
With police and troops deployed in force outside their mosques, prayer leaders followed texts for their sermons that had been imposed by the authorities calling for an end to "sedition," worshippers said.
Outside the Gamal Abdelnasser mosque in the heart of the capital, an amateur video broadcast by Al-Jazeera television showed anti-regime demonstrators chanting "there is no other God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet."
In Libya's third city Misrata, 150 kilometers east of the capital, residents were expected to turn out in force for the funerals of 30 people killed as they helped evict regime loyalists, a resident said.
With some 500 loyal troops of the Hamza Brigade still holed up at a nearby air base, volunteers were helping to fortify the city with containers and sandbags, the resident told AFP by telephone.
The second city Benghazi, where the unprecedented protests against Gadhafi's four-decade rule first erupted, remained firmly in the hands of rebels, an AFP correspondent said.
But the initial euphoria of the eastern city's liberation was giving way to fear that its weak defenses could be vulnerable to a counter-attack.
At the barracks of the Al-Saiqa (Thunderbolt) special forces unit, an officer who gave his name as Colonel Saeed said: "For now, we are readying ourselves here. We are expecting an attack on Benghazi at any moment."
In the city's courthouse square where the demonstrations started, the faithful gathered for their first Friday prayers free of Gadhafi's rule.
Delivering his sermon alongside the coffins of three men killed in the violent uprising, prayer leader imam Salem Jaber vowed: "We will not abandon Tripoli," to chants of "Allahu akbar (God is greatest) from the congregation.
Already depleted, Gadhafi's regime faced fresh defections, including that of his cousin and close aide Gadhaf al-Dam, who quit "all his official functions," Egyptian state media reported.
Libya's ambassadors to France and to the U.N. cultural organization UNESCO also resigned, the latest in a string of foreign envoys to announce they were "joining the revolution."
The Paris embassy had already been seized by protesters calling themselves the "children of the revolution."
State television said Libyan families would be eligible to receive $400 (290 euros) each and that some public sector workers could get pay rises of as much as 150 percent as Gadhafi's regime sought to deploy its oil wealth to shore up dwindling support.
But the website of the official JANA news agency (Jananews.ly) was inaccessible in Tripoli from Thursday evening, apparently brought down by cyber-activists.
Leading an international outcry over the regime's brutal crackdown, U.S. President Barack Obama consulted the leaders of Britain, France and Italy on how to "immediately" respond.
Britain and France both called on the U.N. Security Council to impose sanctions and for members of the Libyan regime to face prosecution by the International Criminal Court.
In Geneva, the U.N. Human Rights Council met in special session to consider calls to expel Libya over a crackdown that High Commissioner Navi Pillay said was "escalating alarmingly".
EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton said it was time for the 27-nation bloc to adopt "restrictive measures" of its own against Gadhafi's regime, which could include an assets freeze and a travel ban.
U.S. officials said no option had been ruled out, but State Department spokesman Philip Crowley stressed the extreme sensitivity of the situation.
"Whatever steps that we do take, we want them to be effective. And we certainly don't want to take any actions that put either our citizens or the citizens of other countries at risk," he said.
Western governments faced mounting domestic criticism for their failure to organize evacuations more speedily as oil workers stranded in remote desert camps spoke of their supplies being looted amid growing lawlessness.
Italy is preparing a "military operation" to rescue some nationals trapped in the southeast whose food has run out, Defense Minister Ignazio La Russia said.
A U.S.-chartered ferry carrying more than 300 evacuees finally pulled out of the Libyan capital bound for the island of Malta, the U.S. State Department said, after a nerve-wracking delay in Tripoli harbor caused by bad weather.
Crude prices rose again as markets continued to fret about the turmoil in the Middle East despite a promise from the OPEC oil cartel to make up for any loss of production in Libya.
Brent North Sea crude for delivery in April rose 76 cents to $112.12 per barrel, having rocketed the previous day to $119.79 -- the highest level since August 22, 2008 -- before sliding lower as many traders took profits.
Source: Agence France Presse
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