30pc of Gaddafi army capacity destroyed, claims NATO

FE Team | Published: April 06, 2011 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

BRUSSELS, April 5 (Agencies): NATO said Tuesday that allied air strikes have destroyed nearly a third of Libya's military capacity, and the alliance has made the defence of the besieged city of Misrata a priority. "We have taken out 30 per cent of the military capacity of pro-Gaddafi forces," said Brigadier General Mark van Uhm, citing an assessment by the Libya operation's commander, Lieutenant General Charles Bouchard. Van Uhm, NATO's chief of allied operations, told reporters that the pace of strikes has not slowed since NATO took command of bombing operations from a US-led coalition last Thursday on a UN mandate to protect civilians since March 19. He said NATO warplanes conducted 14 strikes Monday alone, including "a number" that hit air defence systems, tanks and armoured vehicles in the area of Misrata, where rebels are holding out under siege from Gaddafi forces. Meanwhile, the first export of oil from rebel-held areas of eastern Libya for almost three weeks is due to begin later. Libya's opposition groups are making plans to load a tanker believed to have now docked at a terminal near Tobruk. It comes as NATO air strikes were reported against pro-Gaddafi forces and rebels gathered near the town of Brega. Libya's government has remained defiant, with an envoy who is visiting Europe insisting that Gaddafi will not step down. Anither report from Tripoli adds, Libya's government said Tuesday it is ready to negotiate reforms but only as long as Moamer Gaddafi is not forced out, as loyalists troops pushed rebel fighters back from the key oil port of Brega. Gaddafi's son Seif al-Islam meanwhile dismissed former foreign minister Mussa Kussa, who defected to the West last week, as just a "sick and old" man who had succumbed to the psychological pressures of war. Libyan government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim told journalists in Tripoli that everything except the departure of Gaddafi was negotiable, saying he was a unifying figure after ruling the nation for four decades. "What kind of political system is implemented in the country? This is negotiable, we can talk about it," Ibrahim said. "We can have anything, elections, referendums." But Gaddafi's future was sacrosanct, he stressed, only hours after opposition rebels flatly rejected a reported peace deal that could see the embattled leader's son take charge of the north African nation.