US pulls out warplanes from Libya as NATO leads
The Libyan government said Tuesday it was ready to negotiate reforms, but refused any talk of Muammar Gaddafi stepping down, as the U.S. military withdrew its fighter jets from the international air campaign in Libya.
"What kind of political system is implemented in the country? This is negotiable, we can talk about it," government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim told journalists. "We can have anything, elections, referendums."
But Gaddafi's future was non-negotiable, he stressed, only hours after opposition fighters flatly rejected a reported peace deal that could see the embattled leader's son take charge of the north African nation.
"We think he (Gaddafi) is very important to lead any transition to a democratic and transparent model," Ibrahim said.
The comments came as a Gaddafi envoy held talks in Turkey and Malta amid U.S. media reports that two of the leader's sons were offering to oversee a transition to democracy that would include his removal from power.
But Italy, Libya's former colonial master, dismissed the diplomatic overtures as not credible. Italy said Gaddafi and his family must leave power and the international community had to stand united against regime diplomacy.
Fierce fighting continued and opposition fighters launched a new attempt to recapture the oil refinery town of Brega.
In a show of defiance, Gaddafi greeted supporters late Monday in his first public appearance since Mar. 22 at his Bab el-Aziziya residence in Tripoli, national television said.
His son Saif al-Islam, long seen as the successor to his father before the wave of protests in the north African country, also briefly showed up at a Tripoli hotel where journalists are staying giving an interview to the BBC.
"Gaddafi and his sons have to leave before any diplomatic negotiations can take place," Transitional National Council spokesman Shamseddin Abdulmelah told AFP, adding the regime had lost any right to talk of a negotiated exit after it continued to pound Misrata, 214 kilometers (132 miles) east of Tripoli.
The U.S. military on Monday withdrew its fighter jets from the international air campaign, after keeping them in the air for another 48 hours at NATO's request.
U.S. combat sorties ended at 2200 GMT, with American warplanes on standby as NATO takes the lead, Pentagon spokesman Captain Darryn James said.
Kadhafi's forces have been targeted by air strikes since Mar. 19 under a U.N. mandate to use "all necessary measures" to protect civilians, but the siege has still not been broken.
Britain said it was not pursuing "an exit strategy for Kadhafi," but a "genuine ceasefire."
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