Gaddafi’s forces target rebels as crisis worsens

MUAMMAR GADDAFI’S forces battled rebels on several fronts in a worsening of Libya’s crisis and unrest erupted in the capital when gunmen fired to break up crowds shouting “Gaddafi is the enemy of God.”

Paris-based Interpol delivered a global alert against Gaddafi and 15 members of his inner circle to help police around the world enforce UN sanctions aimed at ending turmoil in the world’s 12th largest oil exporter.

Vowing “victory or death,” eastern-based rebels pressed home a westwards push toward Gaddafi’s Tripoli stronghold with an attack on the oil town of Ras Lanuf, which lies on a strategic coastal road, claiming to have taken its airport.

In the west, security forces loyal to Gaddafi launched an offensive to retake Zawiyah, a town near the capital that has for days been defying his rule, and residents said 30 civilians had been killed. Among the dead was the town’s rebel commander.

The rebellion in Zawiyah — the closest rebel-held territory to the capital and also the site of an oil refinery — has been an embarrassment to the authorities who are trying to show they control at least the west of the country.

The government had said earlier in the week it was not using military force to retake rebel-held cities although one official did not rule it out if all other options were exhausted.

Eastern regions of the country, around the city of Benghazi, have already spun out of Gaddafi’s control after a popular revolt against his four decades of rule. The rebels’ grip on the coastal highway appears to be strengthening.

The uprising against Gaddafi, the bloodiest yet against a long-serving ruler in the Arab world, has knocked out nearly 50% of the OPEC-member’s 1.6 million barrels of oil per day output, the bedrock of its economy.

The upheaval is causing a humanitarian crisis, especially on the Tunisian border where tens of thousands of foreign workers have fled to safety. But an organised international airlift started to relieve the human flood from Libya as word spread to refugees that planes were taking them home.

The rebels earlier said they were open to talks only on Gaddafi’s exile or resignation following attacks on civilians that have provoked international condemnation, a raft of arms and economic sanctions and a war crimes probe.

“Victory or death ... We will not stop until we liberate all this country,” Mustafa Abdel Jalil, head of the rebel National Libyan Council told supporters of the two-week-old uprising.

Abdullah al-Mahdi, a rebel spokesman, told Al Jazeera opposition fighters would attack the capital once a “no-fly” zone was enforced by international powers to try to shatter Gaddafi’s grip on the country of six million people.

Western nations have called for Gaddafi to go and are considering various options including the imposition of a no-fly zone, but are wary about any offensive military involvement.

In developments likely to raise concern about dwindling food and medical supplies in rebel-held areas, reports from around the vast country suggested a sharp worsening of a conflict the West fears could trigger a refugee exodus to Europe.

In the east, rebels attacked a military base on the outskirts of Ras Lanuf and the army responded with artillery fire and helicopters firing machine guns.

Picture: Libyan rebels fighting near Ras Lanuf in eastern Libya yesterday (AP).