Monday, April 11, 2011

Libyan rebels reject African Union peace plan-Detail Report

Plan to halt civil war flounders with fighting raging over Misurata and NATO refusing to suspend its air campaign.

           
Libyan rebels have rejected an African Union peace plan because it did not address their main demand that Muammar Gaddafi quit and because it proposed reforming a ruling system they want removed.
"The African Union initiative does not include the departure of Gaddafi and his sons from the Libyan political scene, therefore it is outdated," rebel council head Mustafa Abdel Jalil told a news conference in Benghazi on Monday.
He said the rebel council demanded Gaddafi leave from the very first day it was set up.
Council spokesman Hafiz Ghoga also told the news conference: "The initiative speaks of reforms from within the Libyan system and that is rejected."
Earlier in the day, an African Union delegation held talks with the rebel leadership in the opposition's Benghazi stronghold.
South Africa's Jacob Zuma, leading the delegation of five African presidents, said Gaddafi had accepted its initiative, including a ceasefire.
Zuma did not travel from Tripoli to Benghazi with the rest of the delegation, to the surprise of the rebels, but issued a statement when he got home saying the mission was "a huge success".
The AU mission was met with scepticism as rebels said they would only agree to a ceasefire if Muammar Gaddafi's forces were to be withdrawn from towns and streets, and freedom of expression was permitted across Libya.
Representing the African Union, the delegation, which met with Gaddafi on Sunday, had announced that he accepted a roadmap to peace, but refused to say whether the deal included his resignation--a key demand for rebels.
 
Around 200 people waving Libyan rebel flags were gathered outside the airport when the high-level African Union delegation arrived, welcoming its efforts but demanding Gaddafi's overthrow.

"The people must be allowed to go into the streets to express their opinion and the soldiers must return to their barracks," Shamsiddin Abdulmolah, a spokesman for the rebels' Transitional National Council, told the AFP news agency.
"If people are free to come out and demonstrate in Tripoli, then that's it. I imagine all of Libya will be liberated within moments."
He also demanded the release of hundreds of people who have gone missing since the outbreak of the popular uprising and are believed to be held by Gaddafi's forces.
International reaction
The African Union's plan has been given a cautious welcome in capitals around the world, with British foreign secretary William Hague stating that any ceasefire agreement must meet the terms of UN resolutions in full.
Franco Frattini, Italian foreign minister, said it was unlikely Gaddafi would respect any ceasefire, "after the horrific crimes enacted".
And NATO's secretary general, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said that any ceasefire must be "credible and verifiable".
Jacob Zuma, the South African president, said Tripoli had "accepted" the African Union's plan for a ceasefire which would halt a NATO bombing campaign that destroyed 26 loyalist tanks on Sunday alone.
Al Jazeera
                                                

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