Gaddafi under pressure as travel ban issued

EMBATTLED Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, under intense pressure to quit, was slapped with an EU visa ban while ousted Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak was also hit by travel restrictions.

The European Union, moving quickly to avoid a descent into civil war and further bloodshed in Libya, said it had imposed an asset freeze and visa ban on Gaddafi and 25 others accused of brutalising civilians.

In line with a UN resolution adopted on Saturday, the 27-nation bloc banned the supply to Libya of arms, ammunition and related material.

The EU also said it was making contact with Libyans seeking to overthrow Gaddafi’s regime, a day after Washington said it was ready to assist the pro-democracy protesters who have overrun key cities and now control vast swathes of the oil-rich North African state.

Gaddafi’s crumbling regime now controls only some western areas around the capital and a few long-time bastions in the arid south, reporters and witnesses say as France, the United States and Britain urged him to step down.

The US froze €30bn worth of Libyan government assests.

The EU’s energy commissioner said Gaddafi’s regime no longer controls most of Libya’s oil and gas fields as they have fallen in the hands of the opposition.

“There is reason to believe that the majority of the oil and gas fields are no longer under Gaddafi’s control,” Gunther Oettinger told a news conference.

A travel ban meanwhile was also slapped on Egypt’s ousted president Hosni Mubarak.

Besides Mubarak, who resigned and retreated to his home in Sharm el-Sheikh on the Red Sea on February 11 following weeks of protests, the decision also applied to his wife Suzanne, his two sons Ala and Gamal, and their wives.

Mubarak is thought to have grown wealthy during his rule, with the state- owned Al-Ahram newspaper reporting that his family had “secret accounts in Egyptian banks,” including deposits of $147 million (€107m) for his wife and $100m each for his sons.

Egyptian authorities have launched numerous judicial proceedings against those close to Mubarak, most of them based on accusations of corruption and fraud.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said that backing political transitions in the Arab world was not just a matter of ideals, but a “strategic imperative”.

“The United States supports orderly, peaceful and irreversible transitions to real democracies that deliver results for their citizens,” she told the UN Human Rights Council.

Even as she was speaking, fresh clashes erupted between Omani police and protesters, a day after police killed at least one as the turmoil rocking the Arab world reached the normally calm Gulf sultanate.

Hundreds of demonstrators stormed a police station in the key industrial area of Sohar, northwest of the capital Muscat, and police responded by firing tear gas, witnesses said.

The protesters, who are demanding jobs and political reform, continued to man roadblocks around Sohar despite the announcement by the authorities of new benefits for the jobless and more powers for an elected advisory council.

In Algiers, a man died after setting himself alight at the weekend in a protest in front of a government office, the El Watan daily newspaper reported.

It was the fifth death by self-immolation in Algeria since mid-January, soon after days of rioting across much of the country to protest soaring food prices.

About a dozen people have carried out similar protests since then.

The self-immolation of a young Tunisian in December unleashed weeks of protests in that country that toppled president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali after 23 years in power. Similar protests have spread across the Arab world.

In Manama, Bahrain’s Crown Prince Salman said efforts were under way to launch talks with the opposition, which is demanding major political reforms amid a wave of anti-government protests.

The sweeping unrest has affected financial markets, with stocks listed in the energy-rich Gulf states dropping sharply.