Latest news from Libya, Mon. 11th April 2011 Issue: 36

Latest news from Libya, Mon. 11^th April 2011

Issue: 36

Ex-Gaddafi aide ‘Moussa Koussa’ warns against civil war:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-13044846

Libya's most high-profile minister to flee the regime has called on all sides in the conflict to stop his country becoming "a new Somalia".

Speaking publicly for the first time since coming to the UK, ‘Moussa Koussa’ said: "The unity of Libya is essential to any solution and settlement."

He told the BBC: "I ask everybody to avoid taking Libya into civil war."

Mr Koussa was Col Muammar Gaddafi's foreign minister until 12 days ago, when he fled to London.

Is al-Qaeda still relevant?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13003693

As uprisings challenge the old order in the Middle East and North Africa, one organisation which for many years claimed it was at the vanguard of toppling authoritarian regimes has so far played almost no part. So is al-Qaeda still relevant? Do the uprisings represent a threat or an opportunity to its role?

In the short term, al-Qaeda has proved slow to respond and is struggling to make any impact, its ideology of violence undermined, experts believe.

But out of the current chaos and instability in the region, they warn, it could still be able to find new opportunities.

Al-Jazeera English reports: Hospitals in ‘Misrata’, Libya’s third city, had documented about 250 deaths over the past month, most of them civilians.

“We’ve heard disturbing accounts of shelling and shooting at a clinic and in populated areas, killing civilians where no battle was raging,” Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

The watchdog said it spoke to two doctors and 17 evacuees including 35-year-old ‘Jamal Muhammad Suaib’, who lost three family members in an attack by Gaddafi’s militias.

“My wife was holding my son,” he was quoted as saying.

“The bullet hit her in the arm and ricocheted into my son’s face. None of us had a weapon. We were just families looking for [a] safe place to stay.”

Monstrous massacre in ‘Misrata’!

A citizen from ‘Misrata’ has informed us that the city of Misrata’ is currently under a monstrously intensive amount of artillery and missile fire from Gaddafi’s militias and mercenary troops. Gaddafi’s militias are using large scale long range missiles that are normally used to attack across national borders on his own people in ‘Misrata’. Also mercenary militias are using RPG rocket launchers from closer range. As a result hundreds of people been injured or killed; a whole residential area of the city has been levelled. The people of ‘Misrata’ are urgently appealing for aid as the matter is extremely urgent. The citizen pleaded to us saying ‘Where are the coalition forces? And where is NATO? But he reconfirmed that ‘they do not surrender, they are either victorious or are prepared to die’.

Human Rights Watch reports: says that Gaddafi’s militias are violating international law by attacking civilians indiscriminately in ‘Misrata’. Hospitals in Libya’s third city had documented about 250 deaths over the past month, most of them civilians. “We’ve heard disturbing accounts of shelling and shooting at a clinic and in populated areas, killing civilians where no battle was raging,” Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement.

Al-Manara Media reports: have heard from reliable sources that Gaddafi supporters are trying to enter 350 SUV cars (Land Cruisers) into Libya through the border with Algeria. From the same sources, the person responsible behind these cars is called ‘Abdul Aziz Majahid’ who is responsible of ‘Aisha Gaddafi’ Trading Money.

Italy's foreign ministers states Gaddafi must leave Libya:

Italy’s foreign minister has stated that Gaddafi’s departure must be a part of any political initiative in Libya. This statement is in alignment with the wishes of the Libyan people and the Interim Transitional National Council.