Battle for Libya not over yet: NTC
Libya's de facto premier Mahmud Jibril warned in his first address in Tripoli that the hardest battles still lay ahead as fighters loyal to the new rulers closed in on Moamer Kadhafi's hometown Friday.
World police body Interpol called for the fugitive Gaddafi's arrest for alleged crimes against humanity, following a request by the International Criminal Court.
"The battle of liberation is not finished," Jibril said late Thursday after National Transitional Council troops inching towards Bani Walid southeast of Tripoli came under rocket fire from old regime loyalists inside the oasis town.
The NTC has set a Saturday deadline for towns still loyal to Gaddafi to surrender, but Jibril warned that its troops would return to the offensive sooner if attacks on them continued.
"We have the right to defend ourselves even before the deadline," he said.
NTC fighters celebrated Thursday after they captured the Red Valley, 60 kilometres (40 miles) east of Sirte, one of the main lines of defence for Gaddafi's troops in Sirte, an AFP correspondent reported.
The fighters killed at least 18 Gaddafi troops there, and sporadic fighting continued on Friday morning, the correspondent reported.
NTC fighters were making house-to-house searches for snipers, the reporter said.
The NTC forces were now discussing plans to capture Harawa, the next town on the road to Sirte, Gaddafi's hometown.
In a defiant message on Thursday -- his first for several days -- Gaddafi dismissed as lies reports that he had fled to neighbouring Niger, insisting he was still in Libya.
Jibril, who refused to speculate on Gaddafi's whereabouts, admitted that the battle for Libya's liberation would end only with the "capture or elimination of Gaddafi."
The NTC fears Gaddafi will try to slip across one of Libya's porous borders, and Niger strongly denied he was there after a convoy carrying other senior ousted regime officials arrived on Monday.
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