Shishan (Libya), Sep 5 :The fate of one of Muammar Gaddafi's last bastions hung on negotiations today, as Libya's new leaders called for the ousted strongman to stand trial in his homeland when captured.
“We are negotiating through the intermediary of tribal leaders who hope to convince the armed groups (loyal to Gaddafi) to surrender,” Abdullah Kenshil, the chief of the National Transitional Council's negotiating team, said. “We will protect them, we won't do anything to them, we only want to try them, and they will have a fair trial.” A military commander had earlier said talks aimed at securing the peaceful surrender of Gaddafi's forces in Bani Walid had been abandoned and an assault on the oasis town southeast of Tripoli was imminent.
But Kenshil said he was awaiting a response from the pro-Gaddafi forces, who he said numbered between 30 and 50 men, “very well-armed, with machine-guns, rocket-launchers and snipers.”
He said the talks had been going on for several days. “At the beginning they said no, but now we are assuring them that we will protect them against any act of reprisal.” A local spokesman for the NTC now holding most of Libya said the front line was 15 to 20 kilometres north of Bani Walid and that troops were just awaiting orders to advance. “Last night the Gaddafi forces tried to move out. Our fighters responded and there were some clashes lasting a few minutes,” Mahmud Abdelaziz said.
The new government's interim interior minister Ahmed Darrat told AFP he was confident the town's capture was imminent. “We expect Bani Walid to be freed today or tomorrow,” he said.The deputy chief of the military council in Tarhuna, north of Bani Walid, Abdulrazzak Naduri, said, “Everything depends on the negotiations.
“If they refuse (to surrender), we will advance, if the negotiations go well, we will enter and hoist the flag without a fight. It's the last chance, we can't extend our ultimatum again.”
Yesterday, Naduri said Gaddafi's son Saadi was still in Bani Walid, along with other senior figures of the fallen regime, while prominent son Seif al-Islam had fled the town. Civilians coming from Bani Walid said that most of Gaddafi's forces had now fled, taking their heavy weaponry with them into the surrounding mountains. NATO said its warplanes had hit an ammunition store near Bani Walid yesterday, as well as military targets in Gaddafi's coastal hometown of Sirte, Buwayrat west of Sirte and Hun in the Al-Jufra oasis.
NTC forces east of Sirte meanwhile moved to disarm members of the Hussnia tribe suspected of loyalty to the ousted strongman today.
The NTC spokesman in London, Guma al-Gamaty, said that when captured Gaddafi should stand trial in Libya and not at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague that has issued an arrest warrant for suspected crimes against humanity committed during the Libyan uprising. (AFP)
