Libyan Rebels Ultimatum is rejected by Gaddafi Loyalists

TRIPOLI : The Gaddafi loyalist have rejected the Ultimatum of Libyan rebels to surrender until Saturday or face military action against holdout towns. But Colonel Qaddafi’s chief spokesman was quoted on Wednesday as rejecting the deadline.Moussa Ibrahim said in a phone call to the headquarters of The Associated Press in New York that “no dignified honorable nation would accept an ultimatum from armed gangs."

Moussa Ibrahim has once again repeated an offer by Colonel Qaddafi to send a son to negotiate the formation of a transitional government with the insurgents who have driven loyalist forces back into a handful of redoubts along the Mediterranean coast or deep in the desert. But that offer has already been dismissed by the rebels as they seek to consolidate power in the capital and elsewhere.

In the town of Surt which is under control of Gaddafi loyalist and is about 200 miles of Tripoli, Mr. Ibrahim told the A.P., a NATO warplane missile attack has killed 1,000 people, a tally that could not be independently verified.

NATO had said that alliance was focusing its air campaign on a corridor leading from the east into Surt, where there is some speculation that Colonel Qaddafi may have taken refuge. While the whereabouts of Colonel Qaddafi and his most influential sons remains a mystery to outsiders, another unsubstantiated theory suggests that he has fled to the oasis town of Sebha, deep in the desert.