ANTI-GADAFY forces claim to have discovered banned chemical weapons stockpiles in southern desert areas captured from Gadafy loyalists in the last few days.
Spokesmen for the National Transitional Council (NTC) said a depot had been found in the Jufra area, 700km south of Tripoli, during part of an offensive against regime strongholds in the remote south of the country.
The rebels also say they have now taken most of Sebha, the largest town in the area whose tribes were long seen as loyal to Col Gadafy and is an important staging post for travel to Niger, where some former regime figures have fled. Libyan officials have confirmed that a senior intelligence officer was captured there two days ago.
It had been thought that Col Gadafy might have been hiding in Sebha along with his fugitive second son, Saif al-Islam, but NTC fighters found no trace of them.
CNN reported from Sebha that the colonel’s Gadadfa tribe in the town is ready to surrender its weapons and wants to negotiate an agreement with the council.
Correspondent Ben Wedeman also described walking through Col Gadafy’s palace in the town.
Libya was supposed to have destroyed its entire stockpile of chemical weapons in early 2004 as part of a British-engineered rapprochement with the West. It also abandoned a rudimentary nuclear programme.
But the international watchdog, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, said it believed Libya had kept 9.5 tonnes of mustard gas at a secret location: it is that which appears to have now been captured and secured.
In 2010 Libya destroyed nearly 15 tonnes of sulphur mustard, about half of its stockpile. It received an extension to eliminate the rest by May 15th. Twice-yearly inspections have found no evidence of Libya reviving the chemical weapons programme.
The recent interim government forces advance into the south have not been matched by parallel progress on two other fronts. Loyalists are still holding out in Gadafy’s birthplace of Sirte on the Mediterranean coast, though there are signs a new offensive may be looming there.
The capture of Sirte would clear the way for an unbroken link between Tripoli and Benghazi, where the Libyan uprising began in February. Meanwhile, Col Gadafy’s spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said yesterday that Nato air strikes and shelling of Sirte by interim government forces yesterday and the day before had killed 151 people.
His claims could not immediately be verified as the town is largely cut off from communication. Little progress has been seen in Bani Walid, 160km south of Tripoli, with chaotic scenes among poorly organised and often squabbling anti-Gadafy forces.
– (Guardian service)