Splits emerge within Gaddafi regime over alliance with Islamic fundamentalists

“Our advice to Nato is that their alliance with these Islamist groups will not
serve their interests.” Abdul-Ati Obeidi, the country’s foreign minister, is
spearheading attempts to build international support for a tribal-led
national conference that would supersede the NTC in a political process. He
has appealed to his Obeidat tribe, the most powerful in rebel east, to break
the impasse between the rival governments.

Mr Obeidi was yesterday travelling to Greece for talks with his counterpart,
Stavros Lambrinidis to raise pressure on the east to accept talks proposed
by Tripoli.

Khaled Kaim, Mr Obeidi’s deputy, said the outcome of any talks would not be
subject to a “Gaddafi veto” but that Col Gaddafi would accept the overriding
importance of reuniting the divided state.

“I think Saif al-Islam, he was explaining himself, not explaining the position
of the government,” he said. “The position of the leadership is to have a
wide spectrum dialogue among Libyans.”

Both sides must however contend with a more powerful faction unseen in the
bunkers and military command centres of government controlled Libya. Regime
hardliners eschew political and diplomatic moves to find a way out of the
impasse. Key figures include Col Gaddafi’s sons Mottassim and Khamis, who
command key army brigades responsible for holding the front line.

Diplomats believe that long-serving Gaddafi lieutenants Abdulgader al Baghdadi
and Ibrahim Ahmed are central to a core group that believes the regime can
withstand the opposition offensive and Nato bombing. “Gaddafi and his main
men have experience of sanctions and international isolation,” said one
Tripoli based envoy. “They know how to work the loopholes and survive with
propaganda and resilience. It’s madness to think they’ll just give up.”

Middle class Libyans speaking quietly on the fringes of tightly monitored
government trips express fears that without a negotiated settlement the
country will descend into unending warfare. “People don’t want the rebels to
overrun the country because they will kill anyone who ever supported
Gaddafi. They want talks to find new solution so that the country can start
rebuilding without Gaddafi,” said one English-speaking businessman in
central Libya.

Ali Sallabi, the Islamic mullah who talked with Saif al-Islam’s aides, said he
had engaged with Col Gaddafi’s son to negotiate the terms of the regime’s
surrender. However both sides conceded the younger Mr Gaddafi and his
acolytes had maintained contacts with fundamentalists throughout the
uprising.

“The liberals will escape or be killed,” Saif al-Islam told the New York
Times. “Libya will look like Saudi Arabia, like Iran. So what?”

Before the uprising in February against Col Gaddafi’s 42-year rule, Saif
al-Islam had secured Western backing for a rehabilitation scheme that had
seen thousands of jailed extremists released from Libyan jails.

But the regime Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), an al-Qaeda linked terror
group, reformed in the eastern region into a new movement after the February
uprising.

“The LIFG no longer exists under the old name and structure. However, it
regrouped during the revolution under a different name which is (Libyan
Islamic Movement for Change),” said Noman Benotman, a Libyan expert at
Quilliam, a London-based think tank.

“Many of this new group’s members and leaders are fighting alongside the
rebels as part of the TNC.” But Mr Benotman said that many of the Islamic
activists’ former colleagues still based in Tripoli were now openly aligned
to the regime.

Resistance to negotiation has virtually scuppered international peace missions
from both the UN and the African Union.

Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary general, called Mr Mahmudi on Wednesday to
complain that he was frustrated by the regime’s failure to proposals from
his special envoy, Abdel-Elah Al-Khatib.

“The Secretary-General told the Prime Minister he was very troubled that there
had been an absolute lack of progress in the efforts to find a politically
negotiated solution to the crisis in Libya, despite the efforts of his
special envoy,” a spokesman said.