London, April 06: State Department spokesman Mark Toner said, “Nothing to announce here, but we continue to work closely with the opposition. We continue to advise them and communicate with them regularly. But nothing new on that front.” “We are only weeks since the very beginning of any unrest in Libya at all; only a few weeks since the kinetic engagement of NATO and only a little bit longer than that since the US took action unilaterally and multilaterally on a slew of sanctions and that sort of thing,” he said.
After a series of rapid advances, the rebels have witnessed retreats in the recent weeks, faced with a stronger military.After the rebels abandoned Brega today, a rebel officer was quoted as saying by Al Jazeera that the two sides had battled inside the city until nightfall yesterday and then the rebels moved back to the outskirts.Yesterday, opposition fighters had regained ground they had given up the day before.
The channel said that the rebels had not experienced such a push by Gaddafi forces for a few days.However, a spokesman for the opposition’s National Council in Benghazi, Mustafa Gheirani, said that while “setbacks” had been suffered, the opposition would fight on.”There is no revolution without setbacks. But the people will win. Gaddafi cannot rule Libya with his machine – his militias and his mercenaries … We are committed to fighting this tyrant, and either we will drive him out or he will rule a country with no people in it,” he said.Britain, meanwhile, said that European Union diplomats in Brussels are discussing proposals to offer family members and close aides of Gaddafi a lifting of restrictions on their assets, cash and travel if they withdraw support to the regime.
——–PTI