Libyan leader Muammar Gadafy's son has made a bid to divide the fractious Libyan rebellion, telling a newspaper he was forging an alliance with Islamist rebels against their liberal allies.
Saif al-Islam Gadafy's comments, in an interview with the New York Times, were a sign that the Libyan leader's camp hopes to exploit divisions among the rebels revealed by the assassination of their military commander last week.
The newspaper quoted an Islamist rebel leader who confirmed he had been in contact with Col Gadafy's son. However, the rebel leader pledged his continued support for the rebellion and denied a split with the liberal wing of the six-month-old rebellion.
In what would amount to a remarkable reversal of decades of policy, Saif al-Islam Gadafy told the New York Times he had made contact with Islamists among the rebels, led by a figure named Ali Sallabi, and would now form an alliance with them. The Islamists and the government would issue a joint statement on their alliance within days, he said.
"The liberals will escape or be killed," said Saif al-Islam, once seen as a reformist and potential successor to his father.
The newspaper showed a photo of Saif al-Islam, who normally appears neatly groomed in well-tailored Western suits, sporting a newly grown beard and traditional scarf at his interview.
"We will do it together . . . Libya will look like Saudi Arabia, like Iran. So what?" he said. "I know they are terrorists. They are bloody. They are not nice. But you have to accept them," he added of the Islamists.
The rebels scored a victory today, bringing a ship with a seized cargo of government-owned fuel into their port. The docking in Benghazi of the Cartagena, a tanker carrying at least 30,000 tonnes of gasoline, boosts an insurgency that has won broad international military and diplomatic backing but is struggling to oust Col Gadafy.
Col Gadafy has so far remained in control of the capital Tripoli despite severe fuel shortages and rebel advances on three fronts, backed since March by Western air strikes. He has defied hopes in Western states of a swift exit, forcing them to await progress on political and military fronts.
The rebels have faced their own problems, from stalling battlefield momentum to splits among their supporters, revealed starkly last week when military chief Abdel Fattah Younes was killed in circumstances that have yet to be fully explained.
Rebels and pro-Gadafy forces have exchanged fire in the towns of Zlitan and Brega to the east of Tripoli, and a rebel offensive in the Western Mountains appeared to have stalled.
Col Gadafy cracked down firmly on Islamists during his 41 years in power, and many Islamists have joined the rebellion, siding with more liberal, pro-Western rebels trying to oust him.
Reuters