Gaddafi defiant as NATO intensifies Tripoli strikes (Reuters)

TRIPOLI (Reuters) – Loud explosions rocked Tripoli early on Wednesday as NATO kept up its heaviest bombing of the Libyan capital since air strikes began in March, but Muammar Gaddafi vowed to fight to the end.

Attacks continued through Tuesday night and into Wednesday morning with warplanes hitting the city several times an hour. The Libyan leader's government said bombs had killed 31 people.

Saying planes were overhead and bombs were falling around him, Gaddafi spoke defiantly after strikes on his Bab al-Aziziya compound.

"We only have one choice: we will stay in our land dead or alive," he said in a fiery audio address on state television.

It later showed images of what it said was a meeting between Gaddafi and tribal leaders on Tuesday.

President Barack Obama said in Washington there was significant progress in the operation and it was "just a matter of time before Gaddafi goes".

At least 31 people were killed in 60 strikes on Tripoli, government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim told reporters. His account could not be independently verified.

"How could the world sleep tonight knowing that armies of such evil are willingly and knowingly attacking a peaceful capital with 60 rockets and killing people ... while there is a way out of this. To sit down, talk and negotiate," Ibrahim said.

A British defense official said several operations carried out by fighter aircraft had targeted Gaddafi's secret police headquarters and a military installation on Tripoli's southwestern outskirts.

Gaddafi's troops and the rebels have been deadlocked for weeks, with neither side able to hold territory on a road between Ajdabiyah in the east, which Gaddafi's forces shelled on Monday, and the Gaddafi-held oil town of Brega further west.

DIPLOMATIC MOVES

Rebels control the east of Libya, the western city of Misrata and the range of mountains near the border with Tunisia. They have been unable to advance on the capital against Gaddafi's better-equipped fighters.

Gaddafi's forces pulled back to high ground in the Western Mountains outside Yafran, 130 km (80 miles) southwest of Tripoli. The rebels broke a long government siege of the town on Monday.

But a rebel commander in Zintan, in the same region, said Gaddafi's forces were massing on Tuesday in their biggest numbers in the area since the start of the conflict.

Diplomatic overtures were being made to the rebels by world powers, including Russia and China, despite their misgivings about interference in Libya's affairs.

A Russian special envoy for Africa said in the rebel capital of Benghazi on Tuesday that Gaddafi could no longer represent Libya and that Russia was ready to help in any way possible.

In Beijing, the Chinese Foreign Ministry said an Egypt-based Chinese diplomat had visited Benghazi for talks with the rebel-led National Transitional Council.

The Libya contact group of Western and Arab countries agreed in May to provide millions of dollars in non-military aid to help the rebels keep services and the economy running.

They meet on Thursday in the United Arab Emirates to discuss rebel plans and financing for them.

Al-Saedi Gaddafi, one of Gaddafi's sons, said in comments broadcast on state television that the fighting in Libya was an attempt by Islamists to seize power.

"(Muslim) Brotherhood members, Jihadists and Takfiris (other Islamist fundamentalists) should not dream to return to Libya to take charge of it," he said.

"This is a battle of principles. The leader (Muammar Gaddafi) and the Libyan people have nothing to do with it," he said in remarks by telephone to Jamahiriya television.

(Writing by John Irish; editing by Michael Roddy)

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Yemen fighting intensifies, envoy Brennan in talks (Reuters)

SANAA (Reuters) – Forces loyal to President Ali Abdullah Saleh battled with tribal fighters in Yemen's capital on Thursday in clashes that killed dozens as U.S. envoy John Brennan flew around the region to try to stop a looming civil war.

Street fighting in Sanaa which grew out of protests against Saleh's rule since January has killed at least 135 people in the past 10 days, calling into question the future of an impoverished Arab state already near economic disaster.

Heavy fighting continued late into the night, with witnessing saying security forces had fired live bullets at protesters.

State television showed live pictures of the Yemeni Airways building ablaze and blamed tribesmen for setting it on fire. Al Jazeera television said the fire started after government troops targeted the nearby home of a tribal leader.

Saleh has reneged on a deal brokered by the Gulf Arab states to secure a peaceful end to his nearly 33 years in power. President Barack Obama's top counter-terrorism adviser arrived in the region on Wednesday to reinforce the drive to oust him.

Global powers worry that chaos in Yemen, home to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and bordering the biggest oil exporter Saudi Arabia, would raise risks for world oil supplies.

Saleh's special forces were deployed to help "clean up" a ministry held by tribal forces, the Defense Ministry said, as battles near the airport briefly grounded flights.

Abdelqawi al-Qeysi, a spokesman for the Hashed tribal federation said: "The weapons that America gave them to fight terrorism are being used against civilians."

State television showed heavily damaged government buildings which had been taken back by government forces.

The outside world has had little leverage on events in Yemen, where tribal allegiances are the most powerful element in a volatile social fabric, analysts said.

Saudi Arabia, which has strong, longstanding ties with Yemeni tribes, is likely to try to apply another round of pressure on Saleh to step aside to avert disaster in a country of 23 million that is awash with guns.

U.S. envoy John Brennan left Saudi Arabia on Thursday for more talks on Yemen in the United Arab Emirates, a U.S. official in Saudi Arabia said. He will seek the help of the two countries' leaders to pressure Saleh to accept the exit deal.

Late on Thursday, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), whose power transition plan Saleh has refused to sign so far, said it would continue its efforts toward a peaceful solution.

"Abdulattif al-Zayani, the secretary-general of the GCC, confirms ... the GCC (continues) all efforts to help brothers in Yemen to reach a peaceful solution ending the ongoing fighting and to stop the bloodshed," a GCC statement said.

DIVIDED CAPITAL, FRACTURED COUNTRY

Yemen is engulfed in multiple conflicts, with street battles between tribal groups and Saleh's forces in Sanaa, popular unrest across the country and fighting against AQAP and other Islamist militants who seized the coastal city of Zinjibar.

On Thursday, two soldiers were killed in an ambush outside Zinjibar, a local official said, blaming the attack on militants.

One constant factor is Yemen's crippling poverty. Jobs and food are scarce, corruption is rampant and about 40 percent of the population struggles to live on less than $2 a day.

In Sanaa, pro-Saleh forces have been fighting the powerful Hashed tribal confederation led by Sadeq al-Ahmar, with mortars, machineguns and rocket-propelled grenades for nearly two weeks.

The capital is split, with Saleh loyalists holding the south against tribesmen and renegade military units in the north.

Residents said dozens were likely to have been killed in the most recent round of fighting, mostly for control of government buildings and near the compounds of Saleh's tribal foes.

Civilians have been fleeing the city in the thousands, hurriedly packing possessions into their cars.

"It felt as if the artillery shells were flying next to my head ... My wife, my daughter were screaming. It was horrible," resident Sadeq al-Lahbe said before leaving.

"There is no electricity, no water and violent strikes shaking the house. Is this life?"

Security forces raided offices used by the opposition Suhail TV and confiscated equipment, an opposition official said.

The state news agency Saba said several gunmen were arrested at the office, which it said was used to attack nearby areas in the Hasaba district, the scene of intense street clashes.

In Taiz, about 200 km (120 miles) south of Sanaa, Yemeni soldiers fired warning shots at demonstrators protesting against a government they blame for bringing Yemen to the brink of ruin.

Troops later closed off Taiz in an apparent attempt to prevent people from joining planned anti-government demonstrations on Friday, travelers said.

Four elite troops were injured, medical sources said, in an attack officials blamed on the opposition alliance.

The U.N. human rights envoy said this week her office was investigating reports that Yemeni soldiers have killed at least 50 protesters in Taiz since Sunday.

Embassies have closed, diplomats have left and a refugee crisis may develop, with civilians fleeing Zinjibar and other towns. Oman has tightened patrols on its border with Yemen.

"The key risk for the region is either a prolonged stalemate (in Yemen) or a continued deterioration into a power vacuum," said Christian Koch, director of international studies at the Gulf Research Center in Dubai.

"This would accelerate the disintegration of the military institutions, intensify tribal conflicts and divisions, heighten the threat from extremist groups like AQAP by allowing them to spread their influence and possibly plan operations, and spark further separatist tendencies," he said.

(Reporting by Mohammed Mukhashaf in Aden, Khaled al-Mahdi in Taiz, Alister Bull in Washington and Sara Anabtawi, Firouz Sedarat and Nour Merza in Dubai, and Jason Benham in Riyadh; writing by Jon Herskovitz; editing by Alistair Lyon)

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