Interpol issues Gaddafi alert

Interpol has issued an international alert for Muammar Gaddafi and 15 other family members and close associates in a bid to help enforce sanctions against his regime.

The international police organisation issues the orange notice when an act or event poses a risk to public safety.

The alert is sent to Interpol’s 188 members around the world, providing law enforcement and border police information on the targeted individuals that can be used to block their movements and freeze their assets.

Interpol said today that Gaddafi and the other targeted individuals “have been identified as being involved in or complicit in planning attacks, including aerial bombardments, on civilian populations”.

It comes after more than 1,500 protesters marched out of the Murad Agha mosque in Tripoli after noon prayers chanting "the people want to bring the regime down" and waved the red, black and green flag of Libya's pre-Gaddafi monarchy.

The protesters transformed a nearby square, tearing down posters of the Libyan leader and replacing them with the flags. They spray-painted walls with graffiti reading, “Down with Gaddafi” and “Tajoura will dig your grave.”

But soon after the march began, security forces fired tear gas at the crowd.

The protesters scattered, but rejoined to continue their march. Then security forces fired live ammunition, scattering the protesters again – though it was not immediately clear if they fired in the air or at people.

“I am not afraid,” said one 29-year-old man among the protesters. He said in the protests a week ago one of his relatives was shot to death – not by militias, he said, but by a pro-Gaddafi infiltrator among the demonstrations.

“There are many spies among us. But we want to show the world that we are not afraid” he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of fears of retaliation.

Control of the capital is crucial to the Libyan leader, since it remains his strongest remaining bastion amid the uprising that began on February 15 and has broken the entire eastern half of Libya out of his control.

Even some cities in the west near Tripoli have fallen to the uprising, and the opposition has repelled repeated attacks by pro-Gaddafi forces trying to take back the territories.

A large force from a brigade led by one of Gaddafi’s sons led a new attack today on Zawiya, the closest opposition-held city to Tripoli, a resident said.

The troops from the Khamis Brigade – named after the son – attacked Zawiya’s western side, firing mortars and then engaging in battles of heavy machine guns and automatic weapons with armed residents and allied army units, said the resident.

“Our men are fighting back the force, which is big,” the resident said.

Throughout the night and into the early hours today, pro-Gaddafi forces also fired mortars and anti-aircraft guns at the outskirts of opposition-held Misrata, Libya’s third largest city just east of Tripoli, a doctor in the city said.

He said it appeared to be an intimidation tactic, causing no casualties.

The crisis has turned into something of deadlock between the two sides. Gaddafi’s forces have been unable to take back significant ground from the rebellion. At the same time, his opponents, made up of ragtag citizen militias backed by mutinous army units, do not seem to have the capabilities to make a military move against territory still in regime hands.

The rebels’ military commander in Zawiya, the closest opposition-held city to the capital, was killed with three other people in fighting, says an activist.

Alaa al-Zawi says Col Hussein Darbouk was hit by anti-aircraft gunfire during clashes with forces loyal to Gaddafi.

Darbouk and other troops in Zawiya defected to the opposition early on in the uprising and has since been leading rebel forces in the town.

Al-Zawi says three other rebel fighters were killed and dozens of people wounded in the fighting, but he says the city remains under opposition control.