Libyan rebels to form transitional gov’t in Tripoli

TRIPOLI—Libya’s rebels announced Friday a move to govern the country from Tripoli, boosted by a United Nations decision to free up millions of dollars in aid money and despite not having captured fugitive strongman Moammar Gadhafi, who taunted them from his hiding place.

The decision by the National Transitional Council (NTC), the transitional-government-in-waiting, to move from its Benghazi base comes just days after rebel fighters on Sunday overran Tripoli, going on to capture Gadhafi’s headquarters and vast swathes of the capital.

However, pockets of resistance remain in Tripoli while Gadhafi’s coastal home city of Sirte in the center of the country remains in loyalist hands and Libya’s west has yet to be fully won.

Ali Tarhuni, a NTC official, said their leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil would arrive in Tripoli as soon as the security situation permitted.

“I declare the beginning and assumption of the executive committee’s work in Tripoli,” Tarhuni, in charge of oil and financial matters for the rebel council, told a press conference in the capital.

“Long live democratic and constitutional Libya and glory to our martyrs,” he said, announcing the holders of key posts in a new provisional government.

He called on forces loyal to Gadhafi to lay down their arms, and promised they would be treated lawfully.

“Put your weapons down and go home. We will not take revenge. Between us and between you is the law. I promise you will be safe,” he said.

Trappings of gov’t

Western powers have worked to help the rebels start developing the trappings of government and bureaucracy lacking in the oil-rich state after 42 years of an eccentric personality cult.

The UN Security Council released $1.5 billion of seized Libyan assets to be used for emergency aid after the United States and South Africa ended a dispute over the money.

The assets were frozen in US banks, but South Africa had blocked the release on the Security Council’s sanctions committee, saying it would imply recognition of the NTC.

The last-minute accord with South Africa meant that the US did not press for a Security Council vote. A new request was immediately made and approved by the Libya sanctions committee, diplomats said.

“The money will be moving within days,” a US diplomat said.

The new request made no mention of the NTC, only that the money would be directed through the “relevant authorities.”

Washington said on Thursday the money would pay for UN programs, energy bills, health, education and food, and would not be used for any “military purposes.”

Mahmud Jibril, number two in the NTC, said on Friday in Istanbul it was essential that the West release all of Libya’s frozen assets.

“There will be high expectations after the collapse of the regime. The frozen assets must be released for the success of the new government to be established after the Gadhafi regime,” he told a news conference.

“Salaries of civil servants need to be paid. Life needs to continue on its normal course,” Jibril said, a day after senior diplomats of the Libya Contact Group met in Istanbul and agreed to speed up release of some $2.5 billion in frozen Libyan assets by the middle of next week.

Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said Rome would next week release 350 million euros ($504 million) frozen in Italian banks.

Jibril said the NTC will seek to occupy the seat that Libya holds at the UN next month following the apparent overthrow of Gadhafi.

But with loyalists holding out in the capital, in Gadhafi’s home city and deep in the inland desert, violence could go on for some time, testing the rebel government’s ability to keep order when it moves from its eastern stronghold.

The shift is seen as a crucial step to smoothing over rifts in the country, fragmented by regional and tribal divisions, particularly between east and west.

Gadhafi taunted his enemies and their Western backers, calling on his supporters to fight back in the city in a new broadcast rallying cry on Thursday.

“The tribes … must march on Tripoli,” Gadhafi said in an audio message aired on a sympathetic TV channel.

“Do not leave Tripoli to those rats, kill them, defeat them quickly … The enemy is delusional, Nato is retreating,” he shouted, sounding firmer and clearer than in a similar speech released on Wednesday.

Though his enemies believe Gadhafi, 69, is still in the capital, they fear he could flee by long-prepared escape routes, using tunnels and bunkers, to rally an insurgency.

Rebel forces to Sirte

The rebels are intent on finding him so they can proclaim final victory in an uprising that began six months ago and was all but crushed by government forces before North Atlantic Treaty Organization (Nato) warplanes gave crucial air support.

While Britain’s defense minister said Nato was providing intelligence assets to help the rebels find Gadhafi, the US State Department said neither Nato nor Washington was involved in the manhunt.

Rebel leaders say they want to put Gadhafi on trial, and he also faces charges of crimes against humanity along with his son Seif al-Islam and spymaster Abdullah al-Senussi at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

The NTC has offered a $1.7 million reward for the capture of Gadhafi, dead or alive, and an amnesty to any members of his inner circle who kill or capture him.

Beyond Tripoli, rebel commanders said they were readying a new advance against forces defending Sirte, 360 kilometers east of Tripoli, and would seek to break a siege of Zuwarah, a town to the west.

UN police assistance

Western powers, mindful of the bloodshed in Iraq, have made clear they do not want to engage their troops in Libya. But a US State Department spokesperson said Washington would look favorably on any Libyan request for UN police assistance—something some say might aid a transition to democracy.

The lack of security will be just one of many challenges facing Libya’s new masters as they try to meet the expectations of young men now bearing arms and to heal ethnic, tribal and other divisions that have been exacerbated by civil war.

Squads of irregular, anti-Gadhafi fighters who had swept into Tripoli on Sunday were now rushing from one site to another, firing assault rifles, machine guns and antiaircraft cannon bolted to the backs of pick-up trucks.

The US and Nato are also deeply concerned about possible looting and resale of weapons from Libyan arsenals, though the US State Department said it believed Libya’s stocks of concentrated uranium and mustard agent were secure.

However, with fighting raging, there was already evidence of the kind of bitter bloodletting in recent days that the rebel leaders are anxious to stop in the interest of uniting Libyans, including former Gadhafi supporters, in a democracy.

A Reuters correspondent counted 30 bodies, apparently of troops and gunmen who had fought for Gadhafi, at a site in central Tripoli. At least two had their hands bound. One was strapped to a hospital trolley with a drip still in his arm. All the bodies had been riddled with bullets.

Elsewhere, a British medical worker said she had counted 17 bodies who she believed were of prisoners executed by Gadhafi’s forces. One wounded man said he had survived the incident, when prison guards had sprayed inmates with gunfire on Tuesday as the rebel forces entered Gadhafi’s compound.

20,000 dead

Jalil on Thursday gave the grim assessment that more than 20,000 people had been killed in the drive launched in mid-February to end the strongman’s 42-year iron rule.

Nonetheless, many count themselves happy already that Gadhafi has gone.

“I was nine years old when Gadhafi came to power and I’ve always hoped I wouldn’t die before I saw this day,” said Ali Salem al-Gharyani, choking back tears.

“I am now 50 years old and this is the first time, seeing Gadhafi gone, that I have experienced true joy in my life.” Reports from AFP and Reuters