Opponents of Libya’s Muammer Gaddafi said they were planning demonstrations against the regime in several cities, including the capital Tripoli, on Friday.Several Tripoli residents said they were planning to protest when they left their mosques after Friday prayers, and that they anticipated a violent crackdown by armed pro-Gaddafi militias.
The regime was reported to have launched as series of raids on the homes of suspected opponents in advance of the “Friday of Freedom” protests. Reuters reported that foreign journalists had been barred from leaving their hotel to report on the expected protests.
Rebel Libyan forces moved further west into government-held territory on Thursday, amid attacks by Colonel Gaddafi’s jets and a warning from US President Barack Obama that the conflict could become a bloody stalemate.
The move west came as the rebel forces strengthened their defences in the opposition-controlled east, a day after repulsing the first significant counter-offensive in the region by troops loyal to Col Gaddafi.
As the oil-rich north African state lurches dangerously towards full civil war, government jets attacked Brega, home to Libya’s second-largest hydrocarbons complex, for the second consecutive day and dropped two bombs on Ajdabiyah, an important eastern town. But as in previous air strikes, none of the bombs hit their targets, further strengthening the opposition’s belief that pilots are deliberately disobeying orders.
Seif al-Islam, Col Gaddafi’s son, told Sky News the bombs were intended “just to frighten” opposition forces away.
Rebel fighters, predominantly made up of civilians in pick-up trucks, said their forces had pushed the front line forward to al-Aqaylah, which lies between Brega and Ras Lanuf, a key oil export terminal that is controlled by pro-Gaddafi troops.
“For now we will just stop in al-Aqaylah, but, if the fighting continues, then naturally we will move west,” said Omar Senousi, a rebel fighter.
But there were also reports of pro-regime forces preparing for more counter-attacks. General Ahmed el-Gatrani, a senior army officer in Benghazi, Libya’s second city and the opposition’s headquarters, told the Financial Times that three or four brigades of “mercenaries” were moving east towards Brega and were mobilising around Ras Lanuf.
“We need to keep our calm: there might be a decisive battle between Brega and Ras Lanuf,” Gen Gatrani said. “They [the mercenaries] are very well equipped and have been preparing for a long time.”
Brega was considered important, as it supplies fuel for Benghazi’s power plant and petrol stations in the east, said Mohammed Khamis, an employee at Sirte Oil Company, which operates the oil installations. The facilities were not damaged, but were operating at less than 10 per cent of capacity, he said.
In comments at a press conference in Washington, Mr Obama sought to alter the balance in Libya, making his first on-camera call for the Libyan leader to leave office and warning forces loyal to the government that “history is moving against Col Gaddafi”.
Mr Obama made clear the US was still considering possible military intervention should the fighting grow worse, even though it was concentrating on humanitarian assistance, with the dispatch of jets to take Egyptian refugees from Libya back home.
While the White House and Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, have floated the idea of a no-fly zone, many US allies and the Pentagon have expressed misgivings, if not resistance, to such a move.
“There is a danger of a stalemate that over time could be bloody,” Mr Obama said. “What I want to make sure of is that the US has full capacity to act, potentially rapidly, if the situation deteriorated in such a way that you had a humanitarian crisis on our hands or a situation in which defenceless civilians were finding themselves trapped and in great danger.”
Officials with the opposition’s national council, which claims that it is now Libya’s legitimate representative, have insisted that they have been encouraging rebel fighters to maintain a defensive mode to avoid plunging the country into full-blown civil war. But they seem to have little control over volunteer fighters, some of whom went into battle on Wednesday armed only with knives and meat cleavers.
The opposition have also rejected talks with Col Gaddafi’s regime and a plan by Hugo Chávez, the Venezuelan president, to form a “committee of peace” of various countries to mediate between western powers and the Libyan leader.
