Libyan Revolution Week 33

[joshcryer]

[joshcryer]

1. Libyan Revolution Day 226 updates below, current time in Libya, 8:55am Saturday, October 1

[joshcryer]

2. Rights group calls on Libya to stop prisoner abuse

http://news.yahoo.com/rights-group-calls-libya-stop-prisoner-abuse-191354604.html">Rights group calls on Libya to stop prisoner abuse
Human Rights Watch called on Libya's new rulers to stop armed groups from rounding up suspected Moammar Gadhafi supporters and abusing them, saying Friday that some detainees reporting beatings and electric shocks had the scars to prove it.

The treatment of prisoners has become a litmus test for the transitional government as it tries to rein in young men who fought in the civil war that ousted Gadhafi and now refuse to lay down their weapons.

The New York-based rights group said it had visited 20 detention facilities in Tripoli and interviewed 53 inmates, including 37 Libyans and 16 sub-Saharan Africans. Five were considered "high value" because of their positions in Gadhafi's government, the report said, without elaborating.

Human Rights Watch, which said it was given unrestricted access to the detainees, said the allegations were even more troubling because Gadhafi's regime was known to torture and kill inmates in its prisons.

Gaddafi didn't even allow HRW in his part of the country to talk to detainees...

[tabatha]

20. Prisoner abuse of any kind is not acceptable

The group said it was encouraged that the de facto prime minister, Mahmoud Jibril, promised to make ending prisoner abuse a priority. "Prisoner abuse of any kind is not acceptable," he was quoted as saying. "We joined the revolution to end such mistreatment, not to see it continue in any form."

The group said some of the dark-skinned Libyans and detainees from sub-Saharan Africa were even forced to do manual labor, including carrying heavy materials, cleaning and renovating buildings around Tripoli or on military bases.

Human Rights Watch blamed part of the problem on a lack of oversight and security forces operating with little experience. It gave credit to some groups, saying one apparently issued arrest warrants, conditions had improved in some facilities and some abusive guards had been arrested themselves and replaced.

But the group urged the NTC to make it a priority to bring the various neighborhood militias and security brigades under a unified command and set clear standards for their conduct.

Same link

[joshcryer]

3. Anti-Qaddafi Fighters Are Accused of Torture

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/01/world/africa/anti-qaddafi-fighters-are-accused-of-torture.html?_r=2&ref=world">Anti-Qaddafi Fighters Are Accused of Torture
First there were the blindfold, the wrist-scarring handcuffs and the death threats. Then came beatings and electric shocks. In the fog of pain, the detainee, who said he had done nothing wrong, would have confessed to anything, he later recalled.

The techniques were familiar to Libyans, but the perpetrators were not: they were former rebels, according to the detainee, a 36-year-old man who said he had worked in military intelligence for the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

The man, who requested that his name not be published because he feared retribution from his former captors, said he was arrested by armed former rebels almost two weeks ago, held in a building for four days and tortured.

...

A doctor treated him, and one of his captors congratulated him on being cleared of wrongdoing, adding, “This is a clean revolution.”

[joshcryer]

4. Libyans Loot Weapons From Desert Cache

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203405504576602201905770000.html?mod=wsj_share_tweet_bot">Libyans Loot Weapons From Desert Cache
Libya—Spread across the desert here off the Sirte-Waddan road sits one of the biggest threats to Western hopes for Libya: a massive, unguarded weapons depot that is being pillaged daily by anti-Gadhafi military units, hired work crews and any enterprising individual who has the right vehicle and chooses to make the trip.

In one of dozens of warehouses the size of a single-family home, Soviet-era guided missiles remain wrapped inside crates stacked to the 15-foot ceiling. In another, dusted with sand, are dozens of sealed cases labeled "warhead."

[CJvR]

15. One wonders why...

...NATO didn't bomb it to hell once the Gaddafis lost Tripolis. Unless it is located between a hospital, a school, a mosque and a kindergarten (where I would place it if I were Gaddafi).

[joshcryer]

5. Young People in Benghazi Prepare to Take the Lead on Human Rights in a Democratic Libya

http://shabablibya.org/news/young-people-in-benghazi-prepare-to-take-the-lead-on-human-rights-in-a-democratic-libya">Young People in Benghazi Prepare to Take the Lead on Human Rights in a Democratic Libya
“When I was four, the government took my father,” said nineteen-year-old Aliya El-Sharif. Speaking for the first time in public about how her father was killed along with more than 1,200 other detainees, according to Human Rights Watch, during the 1996 Abu Salim prison massacre in Tripoli. The massacre stands as one of the more egregious human rights violations perpetrated by the Gadhafi regime.

This month, exactly six months after the forces of Muammsr Gadhafi forces arrived at the doorstep of her city, Benghazi, threatening to fill the streets with the blood of its people, Aliya spoke at the closing ceremony of a six-day, USAID-funded training workshop on human rights.

Led by human rights experts from the Warsaw-based Helsinki Foundation, the workshop provided participants with tactics for identifying and reporting human rights abuses, seeking justice for those abuses, and advocating for human rights protections. The course was implemented in cooperation with two local civil society groups – Human Rights Solidarity and the Libyan Center for Development and Human Rights – that helped select the twenty-five students and young professionals who aspire to become civil society leaders and advocates for the rights of fellow citizens. The Libyan groups are now providing these aspiring leaders with opportunities for further engagement and advocacy within their respective organizations.

...

“After 14 years (the regime) gave me a death certificate. I don’t tell you this to feel sad for me, I want to express that I now know how terribly me and my father’s rights were violated – the right of a fair trial, the right of freedom, and most importantly the right to life. I thank you for giving providing us with the knowledge to build a better future and ensure that our rights won’t be violated again,” Aliya said.
Ibrahim El-Gehani, 17, added: “Human rights, a concept so important to maintaining world peace that has served so many people worldwide, is a key factor in the future Libya that we all envision.”

US AID report, every single one of those people are evil fascists. :sarcasm:

[joshcryer]

6. What Obama and American Liberals Don’t Understand About the Arab Spring

http://www.tnr.com/article/environment-energy/95538/arab-spring-obama-realism-democracy-neoconservatives-mubarak">What Obama and American Liberals Don’t Understand About the Arab Spring
Throughout the Arab spring, analysts and policymakers have debated the proper role that the United States should be playing in the Middle East. A small number argued that the U.S. should adopt a more interventionist policy to address Arab grievances; others, that Arab grievances are themselves the result of our aggressive, interventionist policies; and still more that intervention was simply not in our national self-interest. The Obama administration, for its part, attempted to split the difference, moving slowly, especially at the outset, to censure dictators like Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Bashar Al Assad in Syria, while eventually supporting aggressive military action against Muammar Qaddafi in Libya.

The reasons for the Obama administration’s passivity during the Arab spring have been many, but perhaps none is more helpful in explaining it than the notion of “declinism.” With the exception of neoconservatives and a relatively small group of liberal hawks, nearly everyone seems to think America has less power to shape events than it used to. An endless stream of books and articles has riffed on this theme. The most well-known of the genre are Fareed Zakaria’s The Post-American World, Parag Khanna’s The Second World, and, from a more academic perspective, Charles Kupchan’s The End of the American Era.The Obama administration has appropriated some of the main arguments of this literature. An advisor to Obama described U.S. strategy in Libya as “leading from behind,” which Ryan Lizza, in The New Yorker, explained as coming from the belief “that the relative power of the U.S. is declining … and that the U.S. is reviled in many parts of the world.”

But in an ironic twist of fate, even as Americans seem to be placing an all-time low amount of faith in their ability to effect change around the world, many Arabs participating in the recent uprisings—despite their apparent fear and loathing of U.S. power—placed a disproportionate amount of their faith and hopes upon us. Americans—and American liberals, in particular—have yet to grasp this basic paradox. In their time of need, facing imprisonment, torture, and even death, protesters, rebels, and would-be revolutionaries still look to the United States, not elsewhere. Whether they find what they’re looking for is another matter.

Nice, bittersweet piece.

[ellisonz]

10. Same as in 1992 when Bush the Elder let Saddam massacre the Shiites...

Despite having ample ability to do something about it.

[joshcryer]

7. R2P and the Libya mission

http://www.taiwannews.com.tw/etn/news_content.php?id=1722844">R2P and the Libya mission
The Palestinian bid for statehood and traffic congestion weren’t the only things going on in New York last week as the 66th U.N. General Assembly convened. One of the issues privately discussed by foreign ministers at the United Nations was the “responsibility to protect,” or R2P. This concept was central to the U.N. mandate to protect civilians in Libya, which led to NATO’s aerial involvement there. As the dust settles in Tripoli, it has become necessary to refute a powerful myth that has developed among some pundits and politicians. That myth is that R2P bestows “the right to intervene” in Libya.

Even though R2P features in just two paragraphs of the 40-page “outcome document” of the 2005 U.N. World Summit, historian Martin Gilbert has suggested that it constituted “the most significant adjustment to national sovereignty in 360 years.”

R2P’s core idea is that all governments have an obligation to protect their citizens from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. It is primarily a preventive doctrine. However, R2P also acknowledges that we live in an imperfect world and if a state is “manifestly failing” to meet its responsibilities, the international community is obligated to act. It is not a right to intervene but a responsibility to protect.

...

Finally, we can’t be distracted by the obfuscation of those who think that Gadhafi should have been left to his own devices. Or those who argue that Libya is the sole benchmark by which to measure R2P. R2P is not regime change with mood lighting. Each crisis is unique. But a warning to President Bashar Assad of Syria: We are watching and learning.

Extremely precise article. Kudos to the author. More at link, please read. :)

[joshcryer]

8. Libyan aid ship makes its last trip

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20111001/local/Libyan-aid-ship-makes-its-last-trip.387130">Libyan aid ship makes its last trip
Standing on a quay at a Libyan port, a frail, elderly woman trembled and cried tears of joy when she was reunited with her son whom she had not seen or heard from in almost 40 years.

This scene is etched in the memory of Tarig Ali Eddrgash, the captain aboard the Al Entisar, a Libyan fishing boat turned humanitarian-aid vessel that transported the man back into his mother’s arms.

...

Since the Libya uprising started in February, the ship has carried out over 45 trips from Malta to Misurata or Tripoli, helping with evacuations and also reuniting “exiled” Libyans with their families.

Over the last few months the vessel, managed by voluntary organisation I Go Aid Foundation, sent over 180 doctors, 200 journalists and 18,000 tons of humanitarian aid mainly consisting of food, water and medical supplies.

[joshcryer]

9. Libyan peace deal signed over desert town

http://www.euronews.net/2011/10/01/libyan-peace-deal-signed-over-desert-town/">Libyan peace deal signed over desert town
In Libya, Tuareg tribesman signed a peace agreement on Friday with local Arabs over the Saharan desert oasis of Ghadames.

The town had been at the centre of speculation that Muammar Gaddafi was hiding locally under the protection of the tribes.

“There is no way that Gaddafi is in Ghadames or in the Tuareg area,” said one tribesman following the signing ceremony.

“We are with the new regime. We have been with them from the beginning,” added the man.

[ellisonz]

11. Column: In most places around the globe, violence has stopped making sense

In most places around the globe, violence has stopped making sense
Doug Saunders | Columnist profile | E-mail
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
Published Saturday, Oct. 01, 2011 2:00AM EDT

Are we living through the least violent moment in human history? Has there ever been an age, during the past 10,000 years, with fewer wars or mass killings or chances of being murdered?

The answer seems, to me, almost self-evident. There are terrible wars today, but they are extremely scarce, not very intense and do not affect the lives of many people. If we assume that Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Sudan, Syria and Somalia are all “at war” today and all their people are affected, that means that just over 2 per cent of the world’s people know war. If you add simmering events like the Western Sahara conflict, the Middle East showdown and the Mexican drug wars, you might, at a stretch, get up to 4 per cent.
More related to this story

Never before has this been the case. Forty years ago, at least a tenth of the world appeared to be in conflict; 70 years ago, more than half the world was. Earlier, it was no better: Pre-modern history (before 1500) was exceedingly murderous and violent, followed by half a millennium when near-total war was more norm than exception. Violent crime has become a rarity, rather than a part of daily life, almost everywhere.

I realize this. Yet I am also guilty of helping create the opposite perception. I have reported on dozens of murders, more than one mass slaying, and I have done much reporting from Afghanistan, Libya, Bosnia, Kosovo and other places stricken with violence. I offer no apology: We need to know about these things. But the totality of all these front pages does create a false perception of the state of the world.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/opinion/in-most-places-around-the-globe-violence-has-stopped-making-sense/article2186573/?utm_medium=Feeds%3A%20RSS%2FAtom&utm_source=World&utm_content=2186573

[pinboy3niner]

12. Libyan fighters seal off Gadhafi hometown

AP – 45 mins ago


TRIPOLI, Libya (AP) — A Libyan commander says revolutionary forces have completely surrounded Moammar Gadhafi's hometown of Sirte and are engaged in heavy fighting on the city's streets.

Mustafa al-Rubai says fighters from eastern Libya seized control of Sirte's first residential district and a hotel where Gadhafi's snipers were based.

Al-Rubai told The Associated Press on Saturday that even though the fighters have surrounded Sirte from all sides, a path out has been left for civilians who still want to leave the coastal city.

Libyan fighters say that after weeks of fighting Gadhafi's loyalists inside Sirte, they now hold positions about 3 miles (5 kilometers) from the city center.

The Libyan defense ministry has said the fighters also seized the Sirte port, military base and airport last week.

...


http://news.yahoo.com/libyan-fighters-seal-off-gadhafi-hometown-112042424.html

[pinboy3niner]

13. NATO airstikes conducted Friday, September 30

Key Hits 29 SEPTEMBER:


In the vicinity of Sirte: 1 ammunition storage area, 1 multi rocket launcher area.


In the vicinity of Bani Walid: 1 ammunition storage facility, 1 multi rocket launcher.


...


International Humanitarian Assistance Movements as recorded by NATO


Total of Humanitarian Movements**: 1535 (air, ground, maritime)


Ships delivering Humanitarian Assistance 29 SEPTEMBER: 0


Aircrafts delivering Humanitarian Assistance 29 SEPTEMBER: 3


**Some humanitarian movements cover several days.


http://www.nato.int/nato_static/assets/pdf/pdf_2011_09/20110930_110930-oup-update.pdf

[tabatha]

14. An emotional video collection summarizing what has happened in #Zawiya since the beginning of

http://youtu.be/sXZwTjpunxc

[tabatha]

16. ProGadhafi forces attack families fleeing #Sirte say revolutionaries

@PhilBlackCNN ProGadhafi forces attack families fleeing #Sirte say revolutionaries. 3 killed here when car was hit by mortar. #libya

[tabatha]

17. Libya: Landmines planted by Gaddafi forces claim many lives

Unexploded bombs and landmines planted by Colonel Gaddafi's forces as their last line of defence are continuing to claim many lives.

In the town of Zlitan, at least one person has been hurt or killed each day during the past month - many of them children.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15133703

[ellisonz]

32. War crime.

[tabatha]

18. Abu Salim: walls that talk

In September a mass grave was uncovered at Abu Salim, Libya's top-security prison: grim evidence of a notorious massacre. Magnum photographer Stuart Franklin went inside, and spoke to former inmates and families of the victims about how their fight for justice sparked a revolution


In the summer of 2003, Aliya al-Sherif and her mother, Faliha, went to visit Faliha's husband, Mustafa, at Abu Salim prison in Tripoli. It was not an easy journey. They'd driven for 24 hours from their home in Benghazi in Aliya's uncle's white Audi. For a further four hours, they queued in the unrelenting midday heat outside the white prison walls, shuffling forward with boxes of food, shampoo, clothes and medicine, with 60 other families.

They had made the same pilgrimage more than 30 times since Mustafa, an engineer, had been imprisoned without trial eight years before. The family never knew why, and could guess only that he'd fallen out with officials at work. "I remember the day they took my father. I was four years old. I was crying. I wanted candy from my mother." That was 24 June 1995. Aliya will never forget the date: it was the last time she saw her father.

Giant green steel gates slid open to take in the gifts and the letters that had been written with so much tenderness and hope. All surrendered their offerings to the guards. None of those lining up that day would see the person they had come to visit. One older woman, so distraught at not being able to see her son, collapsed and died. "It was awful," says Aliya, now a second-year medical student.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/30/mass-grave-libya-prison-abu-salim

[tabatha]

19. Libyan rebels battle pro-Gaddafi forces in Sirte

Libyan revolutionary forces are engaged in heavy fighting with forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi in the ousted dictator's hometown of Sirte, according to a rebel commander.

Fighters from eastern Libya have seized control of Sirte's first residential district and a hotel where pro-Gaddafi snipers were based, said Mustafa al-Rubai.

After weeks of fighting inside Sirte, forces loyal to the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) say they now hold positions about three miles (5km) from the city centre.

The Libyan defence ministry has said the fighters also seized Sirte's port, military base and airport last week.

Rubai said although the fighters had surrounded Sirte from all sides, a path out had been left for civilians who still wanted to leave the coastal city.

Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) arrived at the besieged city on Saturday with a truckload of supplies.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/01/libyan-rebels-battle-gaddafi-sirte

[pinboy3niner]

21. Red Cross trying to get into Gaddafi hometown

Sat Oct 1, 2011 10:29am GMT


SIRTE Oct 1 (Reuters) - Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross arrived at the hometown of Muammar Gaddafi on Saturday and are trying to enter the besieged Libyan city.

A truckload of supplies and two cars carrying a group of Europeans were seen at a checkpoint manned by anti-Gaddafi fighters about 2 km from the centre of Sirte.

The foreign workers refused to comment but some commanders of forces loyal to the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) said they would try to allow them inside the city.

"There is a pause (in shelling) so families can leave...We are trying to coordinate with the Red Cross," Khaled Al-Nas told Reuters.

...


http://af.reuters.com/article/libyaNews/idAFL5E7L105G20111001?sp=true

[pinboy3niner]

22. Libyan ‘rebel Jew’ returns home after 44-year exile with hopes to join new government

Last Updated: Sat Oct 01, 2011 14:29 pm (KSA) 11:29 am (GMT)


By Emma Farge
Reuters TRIPOLI

...


Libyan Jewish exile David Gerbi said he has dreamed of restoring this synagogue for 10 years, when smoke from New York’s burning twin towers evoked one of the most powerful memories of his Libyan childhood.

The 12-year-old Gerbi and his family fled Tripoli in 1967 when an Arab-Israeli war stoked anger against the Jewish state and led to attacks on Jews in his neighborhood.

Qaddafi expelled the rest of Libya’s 38,000 Jews two years later and confiscated their assets. Most Tripoli synagogues have since been destroyed or converted to mosques. Jewish cemeteries have been razed to make way for office blocks on the coast.

Gerbi says he is the first Jew to return to Libya since the revolt that ousted Muammar Qaddafi in August.

...


Since the revolt against Qaddafi started, Gerbi has been working with NTC officials to promote their cause in South Africa, which only recognized the interim body in late August, and by helping war victims in Benghazi hospitals.

“People called me the ‘rebel Jew’,” he said smiling proudly.

...


http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/10/01/169603.html

[pinboy3niner]

23. Red Cross inside Sirte, bombardment continues

Sat Oct 1, 2011 1:44pm GMT

• Red Cross brings medical supplies into Gaddafi hometown

• Fierce resistance keeps NTC pinned down on eastern front

• Pro-Gaddafi forces in Bani Walid launch raid on NTC


By Rania El Gamal and Joseph Logan


SIRTE, Oct 1 (Reuters) - Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) brought medical supplies into Muammar Gaddafi's besieged hometown of Sirte on Saturday as fears grew that a humanitarian disaster may unfold inside.

...


A truckload of supplies and two cars carrying European ICRC workers arrived at western checkpoint manned by fighters loyal to the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC).

Some NTC commanders said they would try to allow the foreign workers safe passage into the city but shelling continued.

An ICRC worker, Karen Strugg, told Reuters her colleagues had made it inside.

"They're inside delivering medical aid. And they want to come out," Strugg said on a road leading into the centre.

...


On Friday evening, one person was killed and six were wounded when pro-Gaddafi fighters emerged from Bani Walid and staged a surprise attack on the eastern flank of NTC forces stationed to the north, residents of the area told Reuters on Saturday.

...


http://af.reuters.com/article/libyaNews/idAFL5E7L107R20111001?sp=true

[pinboy3niner]

24. First commercial flight since NFZ lands at Tripoli's airport

From AJE Live Blog:

Passengers from Istanbul arrived at Tripoli's airport on Saturday on the first commercial international flight to land in the Libyan capital since the international coalition imposed a no-fly zone over the country last March.

Flags representing Turkey and Libya's new leadership flew outside Mitiga International Airport as the flight landed.

Inside the airport, passengers waited patiently and queued at the check-in desk to board the next flight.

"We are going to Turkey for business because it has been a long time since we travelled. We are happy that the airline is back in the meantime and we thank God," said Tripoli resident Mohammed al-Jaroushi.

The U.N. Security Council resolution imposed the no-fly zone as part of international efforts to protect anti-government protesters under attack from Gaddafi loyalists.

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya-oct-1-2011-1907

[pinboy3niner]

25. NTC fighters advance in Sirte - 'The road to Sirte city center is now open'

Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr just reported that NTC forces on the eastern front in Sirte have succeeded in linking up with those on the western front and they have separated and surrounded remaining pockets of loyalist resistance.

"The road to Sirte city center is now open," Khodr reports.

[joshcryer]

26. AP Exclusive: US general sees end to Libya mission

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44741154/ns/politics/">AP Exclusive: US general sees end to Libya mission
The military mission in Libya is largely complete and NATO's involvement could begin to wrap up as soon as next week after allied leaders meet in Brussels, according to the top U.S. commander for Africa.

Army Gen. Carter Ham, head of U.S. Africa Command, told The Associated Press that American military leaders are expected to give NATO ministers their assessment of the situation during meetings late next week. And NATO could decide to end the mission even though ousted leader Moammar Gadhafi is still at large and his forces are still entrenched in strongholds such as Sirte and Bani Walid.

Just last week, NATO's decision-making body, the North Atlantic Council, agreed to extend the mission over the oil-rich North African nation for another 90 days, but officials have said the decision would be periodically reviewed.

Ham said that the National Transitional Council and its forces should be in "reasonable control" of population centers before the end of the NATO mission, dubbed Unified Protector. And he said they are close to that now.

I actually hope it ends this way, while continued air support would be useful for the rebels, if they finish it up on their own it'll send a strong signal to the international community. I do think that air support will remain though.

[tabatha]

27. Libya's interim government forces to call 2-day truce in Sirte

BreakingNews Breaking News
Libya's interim government forces to call 2-day truce in Sirte to allow civilians to leave town - @AJELive bit.ly/qHVIFc
15 minutes ago

[tabatha]

28. Libya's Newest Concern: Looming Political

Libya's victorious militias are still fighting the last forces loyal to ousted strongman Moammar Gadhafi, but as the military endgame draws closer, some are worrying about the political battles that are just beginning.

The question is an old one for revolutionaries: How to go from a military triumph to a civilian government?

In Libya, the problem is magnified because the fighting is still going on and the military consists of various regional militias that don't answer to a single commander.

...

Ibrahim Madani, a commander of a brigade from Zintan, another militia that saw hard fighting, says the rebel groups will fight to stop Islamists from hijacking the revolution:

"We stop them by talking first, and if they don't want, there's the other way, we can fight until the end," he said. "And not only me; you know there are a thousand of me."

http://egyptday1.blogspot.com/2011/10/fighting-is-still-going-on-and-military.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Egyptday1NowWhat+%28EgyptDay1%2C+Now+What%3F%29

So much for the false claims by autorank

The command structure of the rebel military is LGIG. That's not controversial, it's a fact

and

Those in charge of the military are al Qaeda sympathizer thugs.

[pinboy3niner]

29. Moussa Ibrahim speaks live on Syrian TV to refute reports of his capture

Mussa Ibrahim, the spokesman for Muammar Gaddafi, denied on Saturday claims he had been captured by forces of the country's new regime outside of the deposed Libyan leader's hometown of Sirte.

"This information is a lie and does not reflect reality," a man claiming to be Ibrahim said live on Syrian-based Arrai television, which has become a conduit for declarations by Gaddafi and other elements of his former regime.

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya-oct-1-2011-2151

[tabatha]

30. UPDATE 1-Red Cross gets medicine into Libya's besieged Sirte

Sat Oct 1, 2011 1:24pm EDT
* ICRC deliver kits to treat 200 war-wounded

* Says hospital water tower damaged in fighting

* Residents report food, baby milk shortages (Adds ICRC quotes from Geneva, damage to hospital)

By Joseph Logan and Stephanie Nebehay

SIRTE, Libya/GENEVA, Oct 1 (Reuters) - Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) brought medical supplies into the hometown of ousted Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi on Saturday as concern mounted for people trapped by a bombardment of the surrounded town.

A truckload of supplies and a car carrying European ICRC workers were allowed to pass checkpoints manned by fighters loyal to the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC).

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/01/libya-sirte-redcross-idUSL5E7L10EX20111001

[joshcryer]

33. A far sight better than...

...Gaddafi http://www.siasat.com/english/news/gaddafi-forces-pound-misrata-port-hamper-aid">pounding the port and hampering aid... along with trying to http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/africa/news/article_1636010.php/Gaddafi-loyalists-tried-to-mine-Misurata-port-NATO-says">mine the port.

Kudos to the fighters for allowing ICRC through. It'll go a long way toward building a bridge. The truce will magnify it more.

[joshcryer]

31. Libyans urge Britain: 'Honour David Cameron's pledge and take our wounded soon'

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8801414/Libyans-urge-Britain-Honour-David-Camerons-pledge-and-take-our-wounded-soon.html">Libyans urge Britain: 'Honour David Cameron's pledge and take our wounded soon'
The Libyan crowd waved Union Jacks and revolutionary flags as the Prime Minister's helicopter came in to land at Tripoli Medical Centre, and then David Cameron bounded out to a hero's welcome. The cheers on his historic visit last month were loudest when he announced that severely injured casualties from the war against Muammar Gaddafi would be brought to Britain for treatment.

But The Sunday Telegraph has learnt that only one boy has been evacuated to a National Health Service hospital, and it is still not clear when Britain will start receiving wounded from Libya as the Prime Minister promised.

Dr Mohammed Matus, a surgeon at one of Tripoli's leading hospitals and one of the medical professionals urging Britain to take more of the injured, said: "I am requesting you, if you can, help us. Germany and Italy are taking our patients and with many of them it is much easier. Hundreds have been sent abroad from our hospital now – it depends on luck and patience whether they go at all, but none have gone to Britain."

Dr Matus estimated that around 20 patients had died in his hospital in the past month because it was not equipped to treat their injuries.

[tabatha]

34. Baghdadi Mahmoudi on Trial in Tunisia?

Libyan citizens from the city Zuwara accused Baghdadi Mahmoudi, former Libyan Prime Minister, for having issued direct orders to Libyan security and military forces to rape women in different cities, to terrorize families opposed to Gaddafi, and to assassinate people opposing the regime.

A Tunisian lawyer representing the Libyan citizens filed a complaint to the prosecutor of Tunis’ Court of First Instance to authorize its specialized security services to sue the accused for inciting mass murder and rape.

Sami Bousarsar, the lawyer at the Court of Cassation, who undertook the complaint for his Libyan plaintiffs, said that it is not clear, yet, whether Tunisian courts are sufficiently specialized for dealing with the case. He specified that the complaint will push the Tunisian government to either put Mahmoudi on trial in Tunisia or to hand him over, which would activate the 1961 Bilateral Agreement of Judicial Cooperation for Handing Over Criminals.

Nizar Jabri, General Secretary of the National Lawyers Association, argued that while the handing over of Mahmoudi to Libya would fall under the 1961 Agreement, given the exceptional circumstances in Libya, it would not be appropriate to hand him over to some parties that might take revenge on him.

Source: Al-Maghreb

http://egyptday1.blogspot.com/2011/10/baghdadi-mahmoudi-on-trial-in-tunisia.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Egyptday1NowWhat+%28EgyptDay1%2C+Now+What%3F%29

[joshcryer]

35. Libyan Family Killed Fleeing Gadhafi Hometown

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/libyan-fighters-seal-off-gadhafi-hometown-14645360">Libyan Family Killed Fleeing Gadhafi Hometown
Two children and their parents were killed by machine-gun fire Saturday while trying to flee Moammar Gadhafi's hometown along with hundreds of other residents, as forces loyal to the ousted regime engaged in heavy clashes with revolutionary fighters surrounding the city.

Their bodies were brought to a makeshift hospital outside Sirte, said a doctor there, Nuri Naari. They were hit by machine-gun fire as they drove toward the positions of revolutionary forces on the edges of the city, he said. It was unclear who killed them.

Sirte is one of the last cities to remain in loyalist hands. After months of stalemate in Libya's civil war, anti-Gadhafi forces swept into the capital in August and their leaders set up a transitional government. But the continued fighting in holdout cities and the failure to find and capture Gadhafi has kept Libya's new leaders from being able to declare victory.

Revolutionary forces had given families inside Sirte two days to leave the city starting Friday, said Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, head of the National Transitional Council that now runs the country. They tried to keep a safe corridor open for civilians fleeing the coastal city.

[pinboy3niner]

36. Hugo Chavez sends solidarity to Gaddafi, Syria

Sat Oct 1, 2011 7:52pm GMT


• Venezuelan socialist keeps up support for Arab strongmen

• Blames "Yankee aggression" for unrest in Middle East

• Says his friend Gaddafi being "hunted to kill"


By Deisy Buitrago and Andrew Cawthorne


CARACAS, Oct 1 (Reuters) - Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez said on Saturday he was praying for Libya's deposed leader Muammar Gaddafi and also sent a message of solidarity to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against "Yankee" aggression.

...


"The Libyans are resisting the invasion and aggression. I ask God to protect the life of our brother Muammar Gaddafi. They're hunting him down to kill him," he said.


"No one knows where Gaddafi is, I think he went off to the desert ... to lead the resistance. What else can he do?"

...


"I spoke yesterday with the president of Syria, our brother President Bashar al-Assad," Chavez said in a televised ceremony to present low-cost household appliances for Venezuelans.


"From here, we send our solidarity to the Syrian people, to President Bashar. They are resisting imperial aggression, the attacks of the Yankee empire and its European allies."

...


http://af.reuters.com/article/libyaNews/idAFS1E79005120111001?sp=true

[pinboy3niner]

37. LIBYAN REVOLUTION DAY 227: CURRENT TIME IN LIBYA = 12:05 AM SUNDAY, OCTOBER 2

Libya time = EDT +6 hours, PDT +9 hours, UTC +1 hour, GMT +2 hours

[joshcryer]

38. Libyans launch grassroots efforts to stop deadly weapons flow

http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/01/2434078/libyans-launch-grassroots-efforts.html">Libyans launch grassroots efforts to stop deadly weapons flow
Alarmed at the deadly arsenals piling up in ordinary Libyan neighborhoods, self-appointed community leaders in Tripoli have begun issuing their own gun licenses and, in some cases, conducting raids to retrieve land mines and rockets stored in private homes.

Qatar and other nations flooded Libya with arms during revolutionary forces' six-month struggle to overthrow longtime leader Moammar Gadhafi. And when the NATO-backed former rebels finally toppled the regime just over a month ago, weapons depots in newly liberated territories were left unguarded, flung open for anyone in the market for anti-aircraft guns, heat-seeking rockets and mortar rounds.

Grassroots initiatives to register or confiscate arms from civilians and former rebels constitute the only real push to track the weapons because the National Transitional Council, the de facto ruling authority, is already overstretched with infighting over other security and political affairs.

...

"After the fall of the regime, the weapons are everywhere," said Sheikh Abdul Razak Msherab, a cleric whose Tripoli mosque has issued hundreds of unofficial gun permits to local residents in the past month. "The arms are spreading like crazy and some fighters want to be in charge, or some tribes want to be in charge, so it's very worrying. We had to do something."

[joshcryer]

39. Tabloid for lulz: Mad Dog Gaddafi pays £1m for his life

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/view/213849/Mad-Dog-Gaddafi-pays-1m-for-his-life/">Mad Dog Gaddafi pays £1m for his life
There is a £10million reward on the deposed Libyan tyrant’s head.

He has been forced to match the money by doling out megabucks in bungs.

So far “Mad Dog” Gaddafi has shelled out more than £1million to warlords and Arab tribes to stay safe.

British spooks have discovered the ousted dictator has been using gold and cash to buy their silence to make sure he is looked after in his desert hideaway.

[pinboy3niner]

40. Niger: Libya's NTC can question Saadi Gaddafi in Niamey

Sat Oct 1, 2011 10:46pm GMT


NIAMEY Oct 1 (Reuters) - The government of Niger said on Saturday that Libya's new rulers were welcome to question Muammar Gaddafi's son, Saadi, who has taken refuge in the West African nation, but it was unlikely that he would be extradited to Libya any time soon.

Niger's justice minister, who is also the government spokesman, said on Niger national television late on Saturday that Saadi could be questioned under an existing cooperation agreement between Tripoli and Niamey.

"If it is to question Saadi, the National Transitional Council (NTC), which we have recognised, can freely come to Niger, under the existing accord," said Marou Amadou.

"However, I reaffirm that at this stage...there is no possibility of extraditing Saadi, because ultimately what needs to be applied is international conventions," he said.

...


http://af.reuters.com/article/libyaNews/idAFL5E7L10MW20111001

[tabatha]

41. Germany stifled procedures for a son of Gaddafi

Procedures to Seif al-Arab, a son of the former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, were stifled repeatedly by the German authorities for fear of worsening diplomatic relations with Libya, said the first Saturday in October the weekly Spiegel .

According to the magazine, the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs has served five times in the regional ministry of justice in Munich that detailed investigation of Seif al-Arab, who had studied in the Bavarian capital, could create diplomatic problems.

Between 2006 and 2010, German police had instructed eleven investigation reports against him for arms trafficking, violence against person, driving without a license and contempt of cop, procedures, getting stuck every time they reached "a certain stage " , the paper said. According to the newspaper, police sources accuse the internal German secret service (BND) blocking.

Under the old regime in Libya, Seif al-Arab and three grandchildren of Libyan leader were killed in a raid on NATO the Libyan capital on 30 April. The information was denied the same evening by the Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi .

http://www.lemonde.fr/afrique/article/2011/10/01/l-allemagne-a-etouffe-des-procedures-visant-un-fils-de-kadhafi_1581092_3212.html

[tabatha]

42. 1 Million People to visit libyaalhura.net

@hnaily
Naily@Libya Alhurra
guys i need 1 Million People to visit libyaalhura.net So Could you Please Help me just RT!!
#Libya #USA #IT #News @AJArabic @CNN

New web page for Mo Nabbous's channel.

[tabatha]

43. Counselling Centres For Traumatised Libyan Kids

Alex Rossi, Sky correspondent

Schools across Misratah have been setting up counselling centres to help traumatised pupils cope with the psychological damage caused by the Libyan war.

The city saw the worst fighting during the conflict. It was under siege by Gaddafi forces for months.

For children caught up in the fighting it was a terrifying time. Most of them spent days cowering in basements with no electricity and little water as Gaddafi forces unleashed a barrage of rockets and mortars.

Teacher Sondos Krwad, said many of her pupils are still frightened and are suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.

"There is not one single family who has not missed a man or a cousin in this war. Each family in this city has lost a beloved member."

According to the Interim Health Ministry, more than 2,000 people were killed during the ferocious street battles. Inside the city the scars of war are everywhere.

On Tripoli Street - the main thoroughfare - buildings are charred and broken.

A museum has been set up to remind the world of the crimes committed by Gaddafi's troops.

http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16080967

[tabatha]

44. Two additional mass graves discovered in Sirte today

libyanfslM. Ali Abdallahby OmarAlMukhtar
Two additional mass graves discovered in Sirte today, one under Ibn Sina hospital & one under Refak School inside water well #Feb17 #Libya

[ellisonz]

45. Gaddafi

:nopity:

[pinboy3niner]

46. Egypt military proposes schedule for leaving power

By SARAH EL DEEB - Associated Press | AP – 10 hrs ago


CAIRO (AP) — Egypt's military rulers on Saturday floated a timetable for their exit from power under which presidential elections could be held by late next year.

The proposal is not binding but is the closest thing to a schedule for a return to civilian rule after growing criticism of the generals' management of Egypt's turbulent post-uprising transition period.

The chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Sami Anan, discussed the plan with a with a number of political parties that had threatened to boycott parliamentary elections scheduled to start in late November if their demands for an amended election law went unheeded.

...


In a sign that the tension over the political process is far from over, the generals made no immediate decision to end the emergency laws that give police unquestionable powers to detain and pressure activists. Instead, they said they would study the demands to scrap the Mubarak-era laws.

...


http://news.yahoo.com/egypt-military-proposes-schedule-leaving-power-194951721.html

[pinboy3niner]

47. Red Cross sends medical aid to Sirte

Source: Al Jazeera

Red Cross team delivers urgent supplies to Sirte's main hospital amid heavy fighting in Gaddafi's besieged hometown.

Last Modified: 02 Oct 2011 04:35


Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have delivered medical supplies to Sirte amid growing fears of an unfolding humanitarian disaster in the besieged hometown of Muammar Gaddafi, the ousted Libyan leader.

Mustafa Abdel Jalil, chairman of the ruling National Transitional Council (NTC), said on Friday that its forces had called a two-day truce to allow civilians to leave as people streamed out of Sirte by the hundreds.

But heavy rocket and mortar fire continued from both sides on Saturday, even though NTC commanders outside the town said they were trying to let civilians out.

NTC fighters in Sirte told the Reuters news agency that NATO planes had dropped flyers urging civilians to flee the fighting.

...


On Saturday, NTC forces in Sirte said they have captured the headquarters of the Saadi Gaddafi brigades, an army unit led by Gaddafi's third son.

...


Story and video report from Zeina Khodr in Sirte (1:58):
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/africa/2011/10/201110233755682935.html

[pinboy3niner]

48. Emergency looms in Gaddafi's last bastion

By Rory Mulholland, AFP

October 2, 2011, 4:16 pm

...


A large force of National Transitional Council fighters pushed in from the south to lay siege to the Ouagadougou Conference Centre, a showpiece venue close to the Ibn Sima hospital where Gaddafi hosted the launch of the African Union.

...


A force of some 100 NTC vehicles, including anti-tank guns and multiple missile launchers, had pushed in towards the city centre around midday and laid siege to Gaddafi diehards in the conference centre, one of the largest complexes in Sirte.

"We are surrounding the Ouagadougou Centre," fighter Osama Blao told AFP as he returned from the front line.

...


The ICRC had been trying for weeks to enter Sirte, which has been under siege by NTC forces since the middle of last month.

...


Khadhraoui's team on Saturday included a doctor, a first aid medic and a logistician, he said. It delivered about 150 body bags and 300 "war wounded kits" consisting of drips, drugs, gauze and other medical equipment.

...


http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/10383471/emergency-looms-in-gaddafis-last-bastion/

[Swede]

51. Hopefully this will end soon.

nt

[pinboy3niner]

49. NATO airstrikes conducted Saturday, October 1

Key Hits 1 OCTOBER:


In the vicinity of Bani Walid: 1 multiple rocket launcher firing point, 1 ammunition storage facility.


In the vicinity of Sirte: 1 command and control node, 1 infantry and anti-aircraft artillery staging area, 2 armed vehicles, 4 armoured infantry vehicles, 1 tank.


...


International Humanitarian Assistance Movements as recorded by NATO


Total of Humanitarian Movements**: 1547 (air, ground, maritime)


Ships delivering Humanitarian Assistance 1 OCTOBER: 1


Aircrafts delivering Humanitarian Assistance 1 OCTOBER: 5


**Some humanitarian movements cover several days.


http://www.nato.int/nato_static/assets/pdf/pdf_2011_10/20111002_111002-oup-update.pdf

[pinboy3niner]

50. Yemeni jet mistakenly bombs army post, kills 30

Posted in LBN by Tx4obama:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x5012962

[pinboy3niner]

52. NTC fighters capture Gaddafi loyalist neighborhood in Sirte

From AJE's Live Blog:

East of Sirte on Sunday, NTC fighters returning from the front said they had captured a neighbourhood in the southwest of the city which was home to many Gaddafi supporters.

"Ninety-five percent of Buhadi is under our control," fighter Drisi Mayar said.

"This was a stronghold of Gaddafi. A lot of his relatives and clan members lived there. There was a small military base. We took control yesterday. We had small clashes but it is under our control."

Hundreds of vehicles also streamed out of Sirte on the eastern front during a lull in fighting on Sunday.

One man leaving with his family who gave his name only as Muftah said: "The situation is absolutely pathetic, especially in the hospitals. We have no oxygen, no medicines. Wounded people die even before reaching the hospital.

"Many people have broken open the pharmacies in the city to bring medicines to the hospital but even that is exhausted now."

- AFP

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya-oct-2-2011-1408

[pinboy3niner]

53. Notorious Libya prison now a symbol of Kadafi era

Tripoli's Abu Salim, where 1,200 prisoners were slaughtered 15 years ago, is becoming a monument to Kadafi's ruthlessness and a memorial to the victims.

By Patrick J. McDonnell, Los Angeles Times

October 1, 2011, 5:51 p.m.


Reporting from Tripoli, Libya— The warden didn't leave room for ambiguity: Freedom was not an option, no matter what happened outside the walls, where the gunshots and explosions of a growing insurgency regularly shattered the evening calm.

"If we win, you'll stay here for the rest of your lives," said the man, a functionary of Moammar Kadafi's government whom prisoners knew only as Khalifa. "If we lose, we will kill all of you."

He seemed indifferent about which it would be.

Khaled Abu Harber, a 27-year-old doctor caught smuggling medicine to Libyan rebels, reckoned he was a doomed man. "I don't think any of us thought we would get out alive," he recalled.

...


Abu Salim was more than a prison: It was a brick-and-mortar embodiment of a dictator's capricious sway over his subjects. Motorists avoided driving near it, as if it could draw them into a malevolent gravitational field.

But the notorious lockup also played a part in the revolt that finally toppled Kadafi. And as Libyans start rebuilding their society, it is taking on a new role — as a kind of memorial to Kadafi's victims and a cautionary reminder of how a revolution can go astray.

...


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-libya-prison-20111001,0,1678831,full.story

[pinboy3niner]

54. NTC could announce new cabinet as early as today, sources tell Al Jazeera

From AJE's Live Blog:

Sources have told AJE that Libya's National Transitional Council could announce a new cabinet as early as today, though the position of defence minister remains an obstacle. Mahmoud Jibril, the head of the NTC's executive board, wants to appoint a new figure to that position, though Islamist factions are apparently opposed.

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya-oct-2-2011-1710

[joshcryer]

55. Shortages "killing patients" in Libya siege hospital

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/02/us-libya-idUSL5E7KT4YC20111002">Shortages "killing patients" in Libya siege hospital
People wounded in fighting in Libya's besieged city of Sirte are dying on the operating table because fuel for the hospital generator has run out, medical workers fleeing a worsening humanitarian crisis in the city said on Sunday.

The birth-place of deposed Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, Sirte is one of two towns still holding out against the country's new rulers and civilians are caught in the middle of fierce fighting now in its third week.

The interim government, or National Transitional Council (NTC), declared a two-day truce to allow civilians to escape, but people emerging from the city said they knew nothing of the ceasefire, and that the shooting had not stopped.

"Doctors start operating, then the power goes. They have a few liters of fuel for the generators, then the lights go out when they operate," said a man who gave his name as Al-Sadiq, who said he ran the dialysis unit at Sirte's main hospital.

The doctors on both sides in this battle have been heroes.

[joshcryer]

56. Libya conflict: Hundreds of residents flee Sirte (thanks to cease fire) - video

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15144220">Libya conflict: Hundreds of residents flee Sirte - video
The BBC's Jonathan Head reports on the streams of civilians that are fleeing the besieged Libyan city of Sirte, ousted leader Muammar Gaddafi's birthplace.

Hundreds of residents, in vehicles packed with belongings, are queuing at checkpoints leading out of the city.

Transitional authority forces say they are observing a truce to encourage the remaining civilians to get out, before launching a final assault.

Jonathan Head, reporting from a makeshift fuelling station around 18.5 miles (30km) from Sirte, says that people who have left the city have told him there is a lack of water, fuel and medical treatment.

[joshcryer]

57. Chemical Weapons Captured in Libya: NTC

http://english.cri.cn/6966/2011/10/02/53s661116.htm">Chemical Weapons Captured in Libya: NTC
Chemical weapons had been seized in Libya, an official from its ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) said Sunday.

Nine tons of artillery shells containing mustard gas were found inside a warehouse in an unpopulated area in the southern town of Sabha, Hassan al-Saghir told local media.

...

With the help of the international community and organizations, Libyan authorities were taking necessary measures to dispose of the weapons in a safe way according to world standards, al-Saghir said.

Some Western countries have said Gaddafi controlled a large stockpile of missiles and chemical weapons, including more than 10 tons of artillery shells containing mustard gas.

Wouldn't be surprised if special forces were with the group that found this mustard gas. The west has been trying to get rid of the stockpiles for awhile now.

[joshcryer]

58. Libyan 'revolutionary Jew' to restore synagogue

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/10/02/general-ml-libya-jews_8712160.html">Libyan 'revolutionary Jew' to restore synagogue
An exiled Libyan Jew says he has returned to his homeland to rebuild Tripoli's main synagogue and promote tolerance now that Moammar Gadhafi has been ousted.

David Gerbi, 56, says he fled with his family to Rome in 1967 amid anger over the Mideast war in which Israel captured the Palestinian territories. Gadhafi expelled the rest of Libya's Jewish small community two years later.

Now Gerbi is back with an ambitious goal of restoring the destroyed Dar al-Bishi synagogue in Tripoli's Old City.

He cried as he knocked down a wall blocking the door to the peach-colored building Sunday after getting permission from Libya's new rulers. He says he'll start by clearing garbage piled on the floor.

Picture of the synagogue, it was at one point quite beautiful.

[joshcryer]

59. McCain on Libya: 'We could do enormous things' helping them

http://thehill.com/video/sunday-shows/184969-mccain-on-libyawe-should-be-helping-them">McCain on Libya: 'We could do enormous things' helping them
Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) pressed Sunday for the U.S. government to aid Libya with medical care for wounded anti-Gadhafi soldiers.


McCain visited Libya during the congressional recess and spoke about his experience on CBS's Face the Nation on Sunday. "They've got thousands and thousands of wounded... We should be helping them. They don’t have the medical expertise and talent to be taking care of these people," he urged.

The senator added that the Libyan people are "proud of what we did to help them, and I think we could do enormous things by helping them with the casualties that they've experienced."

Sens. McCain (Ariz.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) traveled to Libya last week wher they met with members of the governing National Transitional Council and later toured Tripoli's Martyrs's Square.

[joshcryer]

60. Libya's Waha Oil faces tough task to fix war damage

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/02/us-libya-oil-waha-idUSTRE79117S20111002">Libya's Waha Oil faces tough task to fix war damage
Forces loyal to deposed Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi have destroyed vehicles and equipment at some fields owned by Libya's Waha Oil company and at others security is still too shaky to visit, an engineer with the company said on Sunday.

Waha Oil is owned by Libya's National Oil Corporation in a joint venture with American firms ConocoPhillips, Marathon and Amerada Hess.

Before the conflict, it pumped nearly half a million barrels of oil per day (380,000 bpd) but it is now producing no crude.

"They (company managers) sent a group of engineers and they have gone around to see the damage, although they were not able to make it to all locations as some are still dangerous because Gaddafi's troops are still there," said Abdullatif Hetwash, an engineer who has worked for Waha Oil for 36 years.

[pinboy3niner]

61. Names of new cabinet members emerging

Al Jazeera's Hashem Ahelbarra, reporting from Tripoli, says the names of some members of the new interim cabinet have begun to emerge late on Sunday evening.

Libya's new defence minister will be a man named Salem Jouha, reportedly a military commander from Misrata. It is hoped that his appointment will please Islamist factions, our correspondent said. Misratis have become a powerful political force in post-Gaddafi Libya, thanks to their fierce resistance during months of siege and perceived military prowess.

Mahmoud Jibril, the NTC prime minister, will keep his position, while Ali Tarhouni, the former oil minister, will be elevated to deputy prime minister, Ahelbarra reported.

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/liveblog/libya-oct-2-2011-1912

[tabatha]

62. Tripoli gets new militia, apparent rebuff to Islamists

Tripoli gets new militia, apparent rebuff to Islamists

By William Maclean

TRIPOLI | Sun Oct 2, 2011 12:06pm EDT
(Reuters) - A Libyan revolutionary officer announced the creation Sunday of an armed group to keep order in Tripoli, a mission analysts say may overlap uneasily with an existing Military Council with the same job which is led by a prominent Islamist.

Announcing the Tripoli Revolutionists Council at a news conference in the capital, Abdullah Ahmed Naker said his force had 22,000 armed men at its disposal, drawn from what he said were 73 factions which had agreed to pool resources.

The move may stir concern about tensions among the many revolutionary militias who play a de facto security role in the capital, where residents say they fear some groups may resort to violence as they jockey for power.

Visiting U.S. Republican Senator John McCain called on the country's interim rulers, the unelected National Transitional Council (NTC), last week to move quickly to get the armed groups under control.

Naker said his group was cooperating with the Tripoli Military Council which is led by Abdulhakim Belhadj, a veteran Islamist foe of Muammar Gaddafi.

He said it would protect citizens' security and property, collect unlicensed weapons, support humanitarian relief work and help create civil society institutions.

But Naker, wearing military fatigues and flanked by tense-looking fighters cradling assault rifles, suggested Belhadj's group, believed by diplomats to be supported by Qatar, was not representative of Tripoli's population and not large enough.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/02/us-libya-militia-idUSTRE79117120111002

[joshcryer]

63. Gadhafi son denies Interpol allegations

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/02/ap/middleeast/main20114483.shtml">Gadhafi son denies Interpol allegations
Moammar Gadhafi's son, al-Saadi, has denied allegations of corruption and intimidation and says an Interpol decision to put him on the equivalent of its most-wanted list is political.

Al-Saadi Gadhafi is under house arrest in Niger, where he fled after Tripoli fell to revolutionary forces. His father and two of his brothers are in hiding.

Interpol issued a red notice for al-Saadi based on accusations he misappropriated property and engaged in "armed intimidation" when he headed the Libyan Football Federation.

Al-Saadi said in an e-mail he "regrets the issue of a red notice by Interpol and strenuously denies the charges made against him."

[uppityperson]

64. kick with thanks since too late to rec

[ellisonz]

65. LAT: Notorious Libya prison now a symbol of Kadafi era

Notorious Libya prison now a symbol of Kadafi era
Tripoli's Abu Salim, where 1,200 prisoners were slaughtered 15 years ago, is becoming a monument to Kadafi's ruthlessness and a memorial to the victims.

By Patrick J. McDonnell, Los Angeles Times

October 1, 2011, 5:51 p.m.
Reporting from Tripoli, Libya—

The warden didn't leave room for ambiguity: Freedom was not an option, no matter what happened outside the walls, where the gunshots and explosions of a growing insurgency regularly shattered the evening calm.

"If we win, you'll stay here for the rest of your lives," said the man, a functionary of Moammar Kadafi's government whom prisoners knew only as Khalifa. "If we lose, we will kill all of you."

He seemed indifferent about which it would be.

Khaled Abu Harber, a 27-year-old doctor caught smuggling medicine to Libyan rebels, reckoned he was a doomed man. "I don't think any of us thought we would get out alive," he recalled.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-libya-prison-20111001,0,3882832.story

[tabatha]

66. Huge number of libyans in bani walid are preparing the battle for the liberation of tripoli #libya

Rumor @justwatching3 Huge number of libyans in bani walid are preparing the battle for the liberation of #tripoli

http://egyptday1.blogspot.com/2011/10/rumor-justwatching3-huge-number-of.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Egyptday1NowWhat+%28EgyptDay1%2C+Now+What%3F%29

[pinboy3niner]

67. Syria opposition launches national council (following in footsteps of Libya's NTC)

By ZEINA KARAM - Associated Press | AP – 5 mins ago.


BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian dissidents formally established on Sunday a broad-based national council designed to overthrow President Bashar Assad's regime, which they accused of pushing the country to the brink of civil war.

The announcement of the Syrian National Council at a news conference in Istanbul, Turkey, appeared to be the most serious step yet to unify a deeply fragmented opposition. It follows five days of intense battles between the Syrian military and army defectors in the country's central region that raised the specter of all-out armed conflict.

Prominent Syrian opposition figure Bourhan Ghalioun, who read out the founding statement of the SNC at a news conference in Istanbul, accused the regime of fomenting sectarian strife in Syria to maintain its grip on power.

"I think that this (Assad) regime has completely lost the world's trust," he said. "The world is waiting for a united Syrian (opposition) that can provide the alternative to this regime, so that they can recognize it," he added.

...


In forming a national council, the Syrians are following in the footsteps of Libyan rebels, who formed a National Transitional Council during the uprising that ousted dictator Moammar Gadhafi. The Libyan council won international recognition and has now become the main governing body that runs the country.

...


http://news.yahoo.com/syria-opposition-launches-national-council-120830910.html

[tabatha]

68. Libyan aid ship makes its last trip

Standing on a quay at a Libyan port, a frail, elderly woman trembled and cried tears of joy when she was reunited with her son whom she had not seen or heard from in almost 40 years.

This scene is etched in the memory of Tarig Ali Eddrgash, the captain aboard the Al Entisar, a Libyan fishing boat turned humanitarian-aid vessel that transported the man back into his mother’s arms.

Her son had been forced into exile in the UK because of the Gaddafi regime. In February, he became one of the hundreds of people ferried to and from Libya and Malta aboard the Al Entisar – which yesterday sailed off on its last aid trip to Libya carrying food and medical supplies. It will now return to being a fishing boat.

http://egyptday1.blogspot.com/2011/10/standing-on-quay-at-libyan-port-frail.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Egyptday1NowWhat+%28EgyptDay1%2C+Now+What%3F%29

[tabatha]

69. An Amazing Sign i saw in #Benghazi

RT @NaelTheLibyan: An Amazing Sign i saw in #Benghazi - #Libya #Feb17 #Tunisia #Egypt #Freedom twitpic.com/6o99iv @changeinlibya


http://twitpic.com/6o99iv

[tabatha]

70. Oct 2 #Sirte situation map.

Oct 2 #Sirte situation map. NTC announces it controls Area 3 and 1. Now mapped, awaiting confirmation on ground. http://pic.twitter.com/04iC5W6I




http://twitter.com/#!/Karybdamoid/status/120282432502120449/photo/1/large

[ellisonz]

87. Looks like not too much longer.

[pinboy3niner]

71. Libyans run gantlet of bullets to escape Sirte

Sun Oct 2, 2011 7:19pm GMT


• Sirte centre of battle with Gaddafi loyalists, NTC

• Thousands of civilians trying to escape city

• Residents say supplies scarce, prices soar


By Rania El Gamal


SIRTE, Libya, Oct 2 (Reuters) - Ali Ramadan's family were on the move for 10 days, dodging artillery fire and sleeping in the open, before they were finally able to get out of the besieged Libyan city of Sirte.

...


It was early in the morning when Ali decided to leave Sirte with his two elderly parents, his sister, his daughters and their families.

Right after dawn is the best time for families to flee because then, residents who escaped say, the chance of being shot by snipers or hit by a rocket is not so great.

...


The distance to the edge of Sirte and safety is only a few kilometres, but the next part of the journey would take them 10 days.

...


"When the bombardment started, we went to a ranch. We moved from one place to another. When the bombardment comes we go to another place. We kept moving from one place to another. We even slept on the beach," said Ramadan's sister, Umm Baki.

...


http://af.reuters.com/article/libyaNews/idAFL5E7L20QN20111002?sp=true

[pinboy3niner]

72. John McCain urges medical aid for Libya

Source: Los Angeles Times

By Katherine Skiba

October 2, 2011, 10:44 a.m.


Sen. John McCain, who visited Libya with other Republican senators last week, said as the military mission there winds down the U.S. should consider helping the North African country cope with its “horrendous” casualties.

The Arizona senator proposed sending some of the injured to the U.S. Army hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, or sending a U.S. hospital ship either to Libya, or, if that was too dangerous, to Malta, a European island nation south of Sicily.

He said the revolution that toppled Moammar Kadafi had left 25,000 people dead, 3,000 maimed and 60,000 wounded. McCain attributed the figures to the country's new government.

The Libyans, he said, “don’t have the medical capability to care for all of these wounded — more are still coming in.”

Treating the wounded, he said, “would be very important in our relations with the Libyan government and people.”

...


http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-mccain-libya-20111002,0,4042569.story?track=rss

[tabatha]

73. A group of journalists summoned by the NTC

Patriots of Misratah - وطنيو مصراته
Alj: A group of journalists summoned by the NTC to a hanger on the outskirts of Benghazi on Saturday were shown about 200 recently discovered SAM-7 anti-aircraft missiles, a small slice of a much larger and potentially deadly stockpile that remains unaccounted for since the uprising against Gaddafi.

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=223988047660127&id=165630860162513

[L. Coyote]

74. After 33 weeks, does any still think of this as a revolution?

Viva France! :rofl:

[tabatha]

75. The Libyans do. They have died for it. In the thousands.

Your ROFL is highly inappropriate.

Do you know how long the South African revolution took? Decades.
Viva the Western countries that applied sanctions, boycotted South Africa, and made it a pariah country.

[joshcryer]

76. Yes. United States Revolutionary War was 8 years. Cuban Revolution was 6 years.

The only thing funny about your comment is its clearly distorted view of what constitutes a revolution.

[tabatha]

81. You forgot to say Vive La France who helped the US with their revolution.

:-)


Jul 2, 2009 – But please -- s'il vous plait -- if you're celebrating France, the proper phrase is "Vive la France," not "Viva la France." Viva is a brand of paper towels.

[joshcryer]

83. And who themselves had a revolution shortly thereafter which lasted ... a decade.

:)

Revolutions, actual revolutions take time, are bloody, and are not short lived.

One should not look at the October Revolution as some sort of defining attribute of "Revolution."

[tabatha]

77. Here are some longer revolutions for you.

2000–2004: The Second Intifada, a continuation of the First Intifada, between Palestinians and Israel.
2001–present: The Taliban insurgency following the 2001 war in Afghanistan which overthrow Taliban rule.
2003–present: The Iraqi insurgency refers to the armed resistance by diverse groups within Iraq to the U.S. occupation of Iraq and to the establishment of a liberal democracy therein.
2003–present: The Darfur rebellion led by the two major rebel groups, the Sudan Liberation Movement (SLM/A) and the Justice and Equality Movement, recruited primarily from the land-
2004–present: The Shi'ite Uprising against the US-led occupation of Iraq.
2004–present: The Naxalite insurgency in India, led by the Communist Party of India (Maoist).
2006–present: The Mexican Drug War.
2007–present: The Civil war in Ingushetia
2007–2009: The Second Tuareg Rebellion in Niger.
2008–present: The Armenian National Congress and HIMA Youth Initiative in Armenia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_revolutions_and_rebellions

It is fun to educate the ignorant.

[Iterate]

85. They fought Mussolini and the Italian fascists for twenty years or so.

About 250,000 Libyans died in that effort. Of course it took a six year "intervention", mainly of the British and the UN, to help them gain independence. Too bad you missed it, it was hilarious.

So, what have you accomplished in the last 33 weeks?

[joshcryer]

78. Libyans run gauntlet of bullets to escape Sirte

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/02/us-libya-sirte-families-idUSTRE7911QF20111002">Libyans run gauntlet of bullets to escape Sirte
Ali Ramadan's family were on the move for 10 days, dodging artillery fire and sleeping in the open, before they were finally able to get out of the besieged Libyan city of Sirte.

The city on the Mediterranean coast is the birth place of Muammar Gaddafi and is at the center of a battle for control between diehard fighters loyal to Libya's deposed leader and forces with the National Transitional Council (NTC), the country's new rulers.

Ramadan and his family, and thousands of civilians like them, are caught in the middle and having to use all their determination and ingenuity to escape.

...

"Every time we try to leave ... they (Gaddafi fighters) stop us and tell us there is fighting outside and we cannot go out now," he said near Sirte.

[tabatha]

79. Libya — is war over?

Libya — is war over?
Nicholas Pelham
Published 26 September 2011

After the colonel's flight from the capital on 21 August, cautious Tripolitans dithered for a bit more than a week, and then decided that the wind was blowing firmly his successors' way. Ten days later, they partied in the streets with popcorn, paper lanterns and 30,000 new Libyan tricolours. The extent of popular participation is inspiring. Where hitherto the Great Leader was so obsessed with omnipresence that he banned soccer players from wearing their own names on their jerseys, a surfeit of new actors has stepped into the vacuum. And in a country where decision-making was routed through one man, new coping mechanisms have emerged to address the hardships caused by an absent government, a plugged-up water supply, intermittent electricity and unpaid salaries.

The sense of local ownership of the revolution is important. No one has stripped the electricity cables from pylons for their copper, as Iraqis did after the United States invaded their country and toppled Saddam Hussein. Libyans, who before the uprising depended on foreign labour, farm their own allotments, run their own shops, sweep the streets and volunteer to work as hospital nurses. Homeowners with private wells open their doors to those with none. On their own initiative, policemen in Fashloum, a working-class district in the centre of Tripoli, met in the mosque on the first Friday after Gaddafi's flight and agreed to re-establish a local force. By midday the following day, 20 policemen had reported for duty.

Residents of housing estates who rarely spoke to each other under Gaddafi have created neighbourhood councils, a combination of elders, the lijan al-sulh (traditional reconciliation committees) and the underground leadership that planned the revolt, as well as respected men from the mosque. Within a week, they were supplying better services than the city's five-star hotels. The mosque in the Hadaba quarter, a poor district of rural migrants, offered air-conditioning and so much water that it spilled into the streets. In the colonel's absence, the people of Tripoli created the very social system he had taught but never realised - a jamahiriya, a decentralised network of grass-roots, non-partisan people's committees.

http://www.newstatesman.com/africa/2011/09/gaddafi-tripoli-government

A revolution, not only in the traditional sense, but in citizen relations and responsibility.

[joshcryer]

80. Impact of the Collapse of the Libyan Regime on Darfur

http://news.sudanvisiondaily.com/details.html?rsnpid=200110">Impact of the Collapse of the Libyan Regime on Darfur
Khartoum - Sudan felt a sense of relief after the Libyan revolutionaries announced their control over all the main cities and strongholds of Gaddafi, where Khartoum recognized in advance the government to be formed by the National Transitional Council in Libya. Khartoum welcomed the collapse of the regime of Colonel Gaddafi as it was the main supporter of the rebel movements in Darfur over the past eight years, especially since all the armed movements, received military support from Gaddafi.

Despite the Khartoum government's knowledge of that, it has remained silent to preserve the non-strained relations between the Tripoli and Khartoum.

The governors of Darfur states unanimously agreed on the positive effects of the collapse of the Libyan regime to the security situation in Darfur, but they were concerned about the negative effects that can occur in the region as a result of the said collapse.

...

The former Gaddafi regime was the main supporter of the Darfur movements, pointing out that if the Libyan regime were existed and effective; it would leave Doha to continue, unless it had the upper hand.

[pinboy3niner]

82. Gaddafi's meddling in sub-Saharan Africa has been 'nothing short of catastrophic'

...Colonel Qaddafi’s involvement in sub-Saharan Africa, said J. Peter Pham, editor of the Journal of the Middle East and Africa, has been “nothing short of catastrophic.”

His meddling in Sudan’s Darfur region and arming of Arab militias there helped lead to the rise of the notorious janjaweed, armed groups that have terrorized civilians for years. His support of the former strongman Charles Taylor in Liberia added to the bloodshed and mayhem in that country. His backing of various rebel factions across the Sahara has destabilized Mali, Chad, Niger, Mauritania, Burkina Faso and others, allowing Al Qaeda to grab a foothold in the vast, unpatrolled deserts.

In the 1970s and 1980s, he recruited thousands of Africans into his Islamic Legion, an experimental Muslim army that failed on the battlefield in places like Chad and then sent so many young men drifting back to their home countries embittered — and heavily armed.

The various African wars that Colonel Qaddafi helped stir up “took hundreds of thousands of lives and displaced millions, and their ripple effects continue to this day,” Mr. Pham said.

Mr. Sissouma’s response to such criticism: “Nobody’s an angel.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/world/africa/16mali.html?_r=2

[tabatha]

84. Al Qaeda

His backing of various rebel factions across the Sahara has destabilized Mali, Chad, Niger, Mauritania, Burkina Faso and others, allowing Al Qaeda to grab a foothold in the vast, unpatrolled deserts.

[pinboy3niner]

86. LIBYAN REVOLUTION DAY 228: CURRENT TIME IN LIBYA = 12:01 AM MONDAY, OCTOBER 3

Libya time = EDT +6 hours, PDT +9 hours, UTC +1 hour, GMT +2 hours

[pinboy3niner]

88. Former Libyan prime minister awaits his fate in Tunisia

Last Updated: Sun Oct 02, 2011 19:05 pm (KSA) 16:05 pm (GMT)

By Al Arabiya
Dubai


Former Libyan Prime Minister Baghdadi Mahmudi has placed the Tunisian government between a rock and a hard place as Libyan revolutionaries are demanding his extradition while his lawyers are calling for him to be granted political asylum for fear of unfair trial or summary execution in case he returns to Libya.

Mahmudi’s case is unfortunately being dealt with politically and not legally or humanitarianly, said member of the ex-premier’s defense team, Mabrouk Kourchid.

...


Extraditing the former prime minister, Kourchid added, would be a disgraceful action on the part of the new democracy in Tunisia since the fate that awaits him in Libya could be described as a crime against humanity.

“It is very likely that Mahmudi will be executed if he goes back to Libya,” said Kouchid.

His lawyer also added that Mahmudi, who is currently detained in a prison outside the capital Tunis, went on hunger strike three days ago.

“His health condition is deplorable now.”

...


http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2011/10/02/169840.html

[Distant Observer]

89. As the opposition is being massacred by the NTC forces, this thread is shown to be pure propaganda

It is just amazing that those promoting war to "protect civilian" can't ask themselves "what would the West be saying if Gaddafi forces were doing to their oppositiong what the NTC has been doing to its opposition."

The blatant hypocrisy unmasks the fraud of the "Libyan revolution."

[joshcryer]

90. Where were you when Misrata was besieged, when Zawiya was purged? Oh, right. Silent.

Now go make your own little OP with all caps about the latest of Axis of Logic propaganda lies, why don't you?

[Distant Observer]

91. I opposed the civil war and call for ceasefire and supervised elections

This bloody conflict could not be justified morally on either side.
External intervention just escalated the bloodshed and destruction as it inevitably does.

[joshcryer]

92. So did I. But Gaddafi never had a cease fire. Zawiya. Misrata. Ajdabiya, Benghazi, all proof.

How can you have "supervised elections" if you won't allow people to peacefully protest? What sort of insanity is that?

[pinboy3niner]

93. Tribal skepticism stalls Libyan politics

Published 02 October 2011 15:29

In the month since Tripoli fell to fighters allied with the National Transitional Council, Libya's new politicians have failed to appoint a new cabinet that better represents the newly freed areas of the country. One sticking point is said to be the important minister of defence, but Libya's various tribes are also skeptical of entrusting power to an untested and unfamiliar authority. Few want to give up their weapons, as the NTC has demanded, until they are sure. Meanwhile, Islamists interested in entering politics say they are being unfairly painted as extremists by more liberal groups. Al Jazeera's Sue Turton reports from Baida (2:55).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnlGHttq124

[joshcryer]

94. Week 33 part 2 here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x2045324