<p>Gaddafi himself declared in an audio broadcast on Thursday that he was still in Libya, cursing as “rats and stray dogs” his NATO-backed opponents who are now trying to run the large, oil-producing North African country.<br /><br />Interim Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril, in Tripoli for the first time since Gadhafi was driven from the capital on August 23, reminded Libyans that “the tyrant” was not yet finished.<br /><br />The security sources in Niger said a party of 14 Libyans, including General Ali Kana, a Tuareg who commanded Gadhafi’s southern troops, a second general and two other top officials had arrived in Agadez in northern Niger on Thursday afternoon. The four senior officials were staying at a Gadhafi-owned hotel in the town.<br /><br />Niger’s government, under pressure from Western powers and Libya’s new rulers to hand over former Gadhafi officials suspected of human rights abuses, has not yet commented. It said it accepted a convoy carrying Mansour Dhao, head of Gadhafi’s security brigades, on Monday on humanitarian grounds. Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) has given Gadhafi-held bastions such as the desert town of Bani Walid, 150 km southeast of Tripoli, and the coastal city of Sirte until Saturday to surrender or face a military assault.<br /><br />Some NTC officials have said Gadhafi must be captured or killed before Libya can be declared liberated and a timetable for elections and a new constitution can start running. “This is a stage where we have to unify and be together. Once the battle is finished ... the political game can start,” Jibril, head of the NTC's interim cabinet, said.<br /><br />Gadhafi said in what Syrian-based Arrai TV said was a live broadcast from Libya: “We will not leave our ancestral land ... The youths are now ready to escalate the resistance against the rats in Tripoli.” <br /><br />Backing up his words, volleys of Grad missiles flew out of Bani Walid, where NTC forces are besieging what they believe to be a hard core of about 150 pro-Gadhafi fighters.<br /></p>
<p>Gaddafi himself declared in an audio broadcast on Thursday that he was still in Libya, cursing as “rats and stray dogs” his NATO-backed opponents who are now trying to run the large, oil-producing North African country.<br /><br />Interim Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril, in Tripoli for the first time since Gadhafi was driven from the capital on August 23, reminded Libyans that “the tyrant” was not yet finished.<br /><br />The security sources in Niger said a party of 14 Libyans, including General Ali Kana, a Tuareg who commanded Gadhafi’s southern troops, a second general and two other top officials had arrived in Agadez in northern Niger on Thursday afternoon. The four senior officials were staying at a Gadhafi-owned hotel in the town.<br /><br />Niger’s government, under pressure from Western powers and Libya’s new rulers to hand over former Gadhafi officials suspected of human rights abuses, has not yet commented. It said it accepted a convoy carrying Mansour Dhao, head of Gadhafi’s security brigades, on Monday on humanitarian grounds. Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) has given Gadhafi-held bastions such as the desert town of Bani Walid, 150 km southeast of Tripoli, and the coastal city of Sirte until Saturday to surrender or face a military assault.<br /><br />Some NTC officials have said Gadhafi must be captured or killed before Libya can be declared liberated and a timetable for elections and a new constitution can start running. “This is a stage where we have to unify and be together. Once the battle is finished ... the political game can start,” Jibril, head of the NTC's interim cabinet, said.<br /><br />Gadhafi said in what Syrian-based Arrai TV said was a live broadcast from Libya: “We will not leave our ancestral land ... The youths are now ready to escalate the resistance against the rats in Tripoli.” <br /><br />Backing up his words, volleys of Grad missiles flew out of Bani Walid, where NTC forces are besieging what they believe to be a hard core of about 150 pro-Gadhafi fighters.<br /></p>