The liberation of Libya will be declared tomorrow in the city of Benghazi, where the revolution that overthrew Muammar Gadafy began, the interim government said today.
"The decision has been taken," a National Transitional Council official said. "The declaration of liberation will be in Benghazi, not Tripoli." He said chairman Mustafa Abdel Jalil will make the announcement.
A declaration of liberation is supposed to signal a formal move of the interim authorities from Benghazi, the second city in the far east, to Tripoli, the capital, in the west. The choice of either Benghazi or Tripoli as the location for the declaration has been the subject of debate and speculation since Gadafy was killed.
Some analysts say that long-standing regional rivalries in a country only put together under Italian colonial rule in the 1930s are part of a complex of tribal, ethnic and other divisions that could hamper a return to stability.
The circumstances of Gadafy’s capture and death remain unclear. Arab TV channels broadcast video footage apparently showing a bloodied Gadafy alive and staggering as he was beaten by a group of men. Later images appeared to show him lying dead on a street.
News of Gadafy’s capture and death prompted wild celebrations in Tripoli and other cities as Libyans hailed the beginning of a new era after more than eight months of bloodshed and two months after the capital fell swiftly to anti-Gadafy forces.
There were unconfirmed reports that several senior aides, including possibly two of Gadafy’s sons, had also been killed or captured when a convoy tried to escape Sirte.
Gadafy's body lay in an old meat store in the rebel stronghold of Misrata today as arguments swirled over his burial and the circumstances of his death.
The burial has been delayed for a few days until Libya's new rulers decide where to bury him, the country's interim oil minister has said. "I told them to keep it in the freezer for a few days... to make sure that everybody knows he is dead," Ali Tarhouni said today.
Asked about the burial arrangements, including where he would be buried, he said: "There is no decision yet."
Another official who declined to named said there was a dispute within the NTC over what to do with Gadafy's body. "They are not agreeing on the place of burial. Under Islam he should have been buried quickly but they have to reach an agreement whether he is to be buried in Misrata, Sirte, or somewhere else," he said.
With a bullet wound visible through the familiar curly hair, the corpse in Misrata bore other marks of the violent end to a violent life that was being broadcast to the world in snatches of grainy cellphone video.
Last night interim Libyan prime minister Mahmoud Jibril, citing a forensic report, said Gadafy died in crossfire between revolutionary supporters and his own supporters after he had been captured.
“Gadafy was taken out of a sewage pipe . . . he didn’t show any resistance. When we started moving him he was hit by a bullet in his right arm and when they put him in a truck he did not have any other injuries,” Mr Jibril told a news conference, reading from the forensic report. “When the car was moving it was caught in crossfire between the revolutionaries and Gadafy forces in which he was hit by a bullet in the head.
“The forensic doctor could not tell if it came from the revolutionaries or from Gadafy’s forces,” the prime minister added.
A doctor who examined Gadafy's body said he had been fatally wounded by a bullet in his intestines.
But a senior interim ruling NTC source said Gadafy was killed by his captors. "While he was being taken away, they beat him and then they killed him," the source said. "He might have been resisting."
In one of the videos that emerged, Gadafy is hauled by his hair from the hood of a truck. Someone is heard shouting: "Keep him alive!"
Gadafy disappears from view and shots ring out.
The United Nations human rights office called today for a full investigation into the former dictator's death and voiced concerns that he may have been executed. Images filmed on mobile phones before and after Gadafy's death showed him wounded and bloodied but clearly alive, and then dead amidst a jostling crowd of anti-Gadafy fighters.
"There's a lot of uncertainty about what happened exactly. There seem to be four or five different versions of how he died," UN human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said. "If you take these two videos together, they are rather disturbing because you see someone who has been captured alive and then you see the same person dead.
"Summary executions are strictly illegal under any circumstances. It's different if someone is killed in combat. There was a civil war taking place in Libya. So if the person died as part of combat, that is a different issue and that is normally acceptable under the circumstances," he said.
An international commission of inquiry, launched by the UN Human Rights Council, is already investigating killings, torture and other crimes in Libya.
Nato said today its aircraft struck 11 vehicles in an armoured convoy of about 75 vehicles carrying Gadafy from his hometown of Sirte, although it did not know at the time he was in the convoy. The account of the air strike that led to Gadafy’s arrest and death suggested the former ruler's fleeing convoy was considerably larger, and more vehicles were hit, than previously reported.
"These armed vehicles were leaving Sirte at high speed and were attempting to force their way around the outskirts of the city,"
Nato said in a statement. "The vehicles were carrying a substantial amount of weapons and ammunition posing a significant threat to the local civilian population. The convoy was engaged by a Nato aircraft to reduce the threat."
The statement said that at the time of the strike, Nato did not know that Gadafy was in the convoy, reiterating that it was not its policy to target individuals. "We later learned from open sources and allied intelligence that Gadafy was in the convoy and that the strike likely contributed to his capture," the statement said.
A Libyan military official said Gadafy was wounded in a Nato air strike before his capture. A doctor who examined his body said he was fatally wounded by a bullet in his intestines following his capture and also had a bullet hole in his head.
The Nato statement did not give details of which Nato countries nations conducted the strikes. But France has said its jets halted the convoy and a Nato official has said that a US drone, an unmanned aircraft, carried out the strikes.
Mr Tarhouni said a decision on who would be prime minister of Libya's interim government would be made "most likely next week," adding that he was a contender. He said the NTC had set a rough timetable of eight months for drafting a new constitution, then holding elections, but added: "I think it will be longer than eight months."
Amnesty International urged the interim authorities to make public the full facts of how Gadafy died, saying all members of the former regime should be treated humanely.
Gadafy, who was wanted by the International Criminal Court on charges of ordering the killing of civilians following protests against his rule in February, was routed from Tripoli in August, days away from the 42nd anniversary of the coup which brought him to power in 1969. He had been at large since then.