Libya rebels on outskirts of Gaddafi's hometown
Libyan rebels prepared yesterday to launch an assault to capture strongman Moamer Gaddafi's hometown of Sirte and win full control of Libya, while scrambling to get war-ravaged Tripoli back on its feet.
Sirte is the elusive Gaddafi's last bastion after rebels smashed his forces in Tripoli and seized his Bab al-Aziziya headquarters.
Meanwhile, Libyan rebel chief Mustafa Abdel Jalil warned in Doha yesterday that Gaddafi still posed a danger inside and outside of Libya and urged no let-up in international action against the strongman.
Fierce fighting also raged in the west of Libya as rebels trying to wrest control of the region from Gaddafi's forces said they had fallen into an ambush in a town southwest of Zuwarah.
Rebel forces moved to within 30 kilometres (18 miles) of Sirte from the west and captured Bin Jawad 100 kilometres to the east, the rebel commander in Misrata, Mohammed al-Fortiya, told AFP.
"We took Bin Jawad today" on the eastern front, and "the thwar (rebel fighters) from Misrata are 30 kilometres from Sirte" in the west, Fortiya said.
Rebels pushing west from the oil hub of Ras Lanuf had been stuck for four days outside Bin Jawad, a key town on the coast road of the Gulf of Sirte, as Gaddafi's forces kept up a defiant resistance.
Although Gaddafi's whereabouts remain a mystery, there is widespread speculation that he is holed up in Sirte, 360 kilometres east of Tripoli, among tribal supporters there.
"We are negotiating with the tribes for Sirte's peaceful surrender," Fortiya said, adding that only tribal leaders were involved, and that to his knowledge no direct contact had been made with Gaddafi himself.
But a spokesman for the NTC, Mahmud Shammam, warned that negotiations for Sirte's peaceful handover would not be open-ended.
"The negotiations will not go on for ever," he said. "The talks are still going on... We would like to unify Libya very quickly."
Sirte has been targeted by Nato warplanes, which on Friday and Saturday destroyed more than 50 military vehicles, two military shelters, a military observation point and a military engineer asset.
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