NEW REGIME:REBEL LEADERS were scrambling last night to maintain law and order and restore basic services in Tripoli after they were taken by surprise by the speed of the city's fall.
The opposition National Transitional Council said yesterday that guards from a specially trained Tripoli brigade, made up of fighters from the capital, were being stationed at the national museum and other cultural sites.
The council negotiated a deal with Tunisian authorities to increase the flow of electricity across the border, and carried out emergency repairs to an oil refinery in the coastal town of Zawiya, allowing fuel to be pumped once more to Tripoli, where most vehicles had ground to a halt.
Mahmoud Shammam, a council spokesman, said half the members of the movement’s executive board, functioning as an interim cabinet, would arrive in Tripoli today to co-ordinate work on maintaining basic services and food supplies, as well as law and order.
Speaking from Tunisia, Mr Shammam said the council was working as fast as it could to implement a Tripoli stabilisation programme, hammered out in recent months with international advice, particularly from British officials. He admitted the speed of the offensive, spearheaded by rebels from Libya’s western highlands, had outpaced the stabilisation effort.
“We are a bit late because we thought it would take longer. The swift movement of the battle has left our officials a little bit behind, but we are trying hard,” he said. “We have negotiated more electricity from the Tunisian government and we have got the Zawiya refinery working. But it would help a lot, and we are screaming at our friends about it, if they could unfreeze some of Libya’s money.”
European governments have pledged to release millions of dollars of Libyan funds, frozen at the start of the conflict, as soon as stability is restored to the country. EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said yesterday the release of funds would have to be approved by the UN, but noted the council would need quick access to funds to ensure civil servants were paid and the economy could be kick-started.
A meeting took place earlier yesterday in Dubai between council officials and experts from an international contact group on how to restore security as soon as possible after the fall of Muammar Gadafy, and on how to avoid a repeat of the chaos and looting that followed the end of the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq in 2003.
The security blueprint was drafted with help from a UK stabilisation response team which visited Benghazi for three weeks in May. Their recommendations were largely adopted by the council.
Among the priorities are the assurance of continuity in the government bureaucracy and civilian police. To that end, messages have been sent to police stations in Tripoli appealing to officers to continue to enforce law and order. Liaison officers in the Tripoli brigade are expected to reassure the police personally that they will be respected in post-Gadafy Libya.
Mr Shammam said the council has been broadcasting public announcements, some by religious leaders, calling on the population to observe “international norms respecting law and order, public property and the collective memory of Libyan people”, a reference to the nation’s museums and cultural artefacts.
Speaking in Brussels yesterday, Ms Ashton said EU states stood ready to help with aid, medical supplies and fuel, as well as helping the council to disarm a population that had grown accustomed to carrying weapons.
Another pressing concern on the ground in Libya was the lack of an international mediator to whom soldiers from Gadafy’s army could surrender. Rebel forces, government columns and soldiers trying to return home are forced to use the same coastal roads, leading to confusion and unnecessary clashes.
Government soldiers taken prisoner have said they were convinced they would be slaughtered if they surrendered, and so rarely did so. Rebel officers said they would like a buffer force that would allow pro-Gadafy units to lay down their arms.
European officials said the new authorities in Tripoli would be able to draw on the EU’s €7 billion neighbourhood policy fund to help support civil society and governance in the newly democratic countries of north Africa.
Ms Ashton made clear that the UN would take the lead international co-ordinating role in Libya and a meeting is planned in New York on Friday involving the UN, EU, African Union and the Organisation of the Islamic Conference to divide responsibilities in post-Gadafy Libya.
A UN spokesman said yesterday there had been no request for UN peacekeepers. – ( Guardianservice)