TRIPOLI, (Reuters) – NATO must broaden the range of targets it is bombing in Libya or risk failing to remove Muammar Gaddafi from power, Britain’s most senior military officer was quoted as saying.
NATO warplanes, acting under a U.N. mandate to protect civilians, have stopped government troops advancing on rebel strongholds but the collapse of Gaddafi’s rule, which many Western governments seek, has not materialised.
After a series of air strikes on his Bab al-Aziziyah compound in Tripoli, Gaddafi taunted the Western military alliance, saying in an audio recording aired on Friday that he was in a place where NATO could not reach him.
General David Richards, Britain’s chief of defence staff, said the military campaign to date had been a “significant success” for NATO, but it needed to do more.
“If we do not up the ante now there is a risk that the conflict could result in Gaddafi clinging to power,” he was quoted in Britain’s Sunday Telegraph newspaper as saying.
“At present, NATO is not attacking infrastructure targets in Libya. But if we want to increase the pressure on Gaddafi’s regime then we need to give serious consideration to increasing the range of targets we can hit,” he said. A spokesman for the Libyan government responded by saying that NATO had already gone beyond its mandate from the United Nations to protect civilians.
“They’ve already been targeting infrastructure,” Khaled Kaim, who is also deputy foreign minister, told a news briefing.
“The interest here is Libyan oil, not protection. It should be called blood for oil, this is the proper name,” Kaim said.
The Libyan official also hit out at the International Criminal Court (ICC), whose prosecutor has said he will request arrest warrants over the killing of civilian protesters, with Gaddafi and some of his sons likely targets.
“The practices of the ICC are questionable. It’s a baby of the European Union designed for (prosecuting) African politicians and leaders,” Kaim said.
Spanish radio, citing ICC sources, said on Friday the warrants would be requested today.
STALEMATE
Three months after a revolt began against Gaddafi’s four-decade rule, fighting between rebels and government forces on several fronts has come to a near-standstill and Gaddafi is refusing to bow to efforts to force him from power.
Thousands of people have been killed in the conflict in Libya, the bloodiest of the revolts which have convulsed the Middle East in what has been called the “Arab Spring”.
Libyan officials deny killing civilians, saying instead they were forced to take action against criminal armed gangs and al Qaeda militants. They say the NATO campaign is an act of colonial aggression aimed at grabbing Libya’s oil.
In the rebel-held city of Misrata, scene of some of the fiercest fighting in the conflict, rebels said they were braced for renewed attacks by forces loyal to Gaddafi.
