Qatar recognizes transitional council HARAWA: Libyan rebels were stopped in their tracks Monday as forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi launched a fierce attack on their convoy, halting their push forward to Sirte for a second time in the day. Meanwhile, Qatar became the first Arab country to recognize Libya's rebels as the people's sole legitimate representative, in a move that may presage similar moves from other Gulf states. “This recognition comes from a conviction that the council has become, practically, a representative of Libya and its brotherly people,” the Qatari Foreign Ministry said in a diplomatic note Monday. Kuwait's foreign minister said Kuwaiti officials had met a council representative and suggested a formal recognition was forthcoming. “This is considered a practical recognition,” Sheikh Mohammad Al-Sabah told reporters. “The matter requires procedures of course, which are subject to international law.” GCC Secretary General Abdulrahman Al-Attiyah told Reuters that Qatar's position was “in line with the decisions of the GCC with Qatar's stance supporting the choices of the Libyan people and their protection from the continuous brutality of the regime”. The rebels came under heavy fire at the village of Harawa, some 60 km short of Gaddafi's birthplace. French journalists at the scene, who escaped unhurt, reported at least two casualties and several rebel pick-up trucks destroyed in the assault. Gaddafi will go on trial in Libya “after victory” by rebel forces, the head of the rebels' National Transitional Council said. “After the victory we will try Gaddafi in Libya for all the crimes he has committed,” Mustafa Abdel Jalil told French television from the eastern rebel stronghold of Benghazi. The council also promised to forgive Gaddafi supporters as long as they turned their backs on the leader. “We ask the people around Gaddafi to abandon him. If they do so, we will forgive their wrongdoings,” the main spokesman for the government-in-waiting, Abdulhafiz Ghoga, told reporters in Benghazi. The leaders of Britain, France, Germany and the United States held talks on the conflict by video conference. The talks between US President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel lasted about 40 minutes, the French president's office said. Ahead of an international conference in London Tuesday, Britain and France called for supporters of the Libyan leader to abandon him “before it's too late” and insisted the rebel National Transitional Council and civil society leaders should help a Libyan transition toward democracy, saying Gaddafi must go immediately.US President Barack Obama was due to address the nation on the conflict later in the day and was expected to tell Americans that the assault on Libya averted a humanitarian “catastrophe”. Gaddafi forces have ended their onslaught on rebel-held Misrata and “calm” has been restored, the Foreign Ministry announced, without clearly indicating whether the town is now back under loyalist control. After their rapid progress Sunday, helped by overnight coalition air raids, Monday proved something of a sticking point and earlier in the day, their advance westwards toward Tripoli was halted about 140 km east of Sirte but later resumed. On Sunday, the rebels had seized Bin Jawad after retaking the key oil town of Raslanuf as they advanced with the support of coalition airstrikes on Gaddafi's forces. But on Monday they came under heavy machine-gun fire from regime loyalists in pick-up trucks on the road from Bin Jawad to Nofilia. The insurgents pulled back into Bin Jawad and opened up with heavy artillery. Later in the day, the advance continued cautiously as the rebels searched houses along the road and appeared to encounter diminishing resistance from Gaddafi loyalists. NATO has finally taken over enforcing a no-fly zone and flew its first enforcement mission over Libya Sunday in the operation codenamed “Unified Protector”. Witnesses in Tripoli said airstrikes targeted the road to the airport 10 km outside the city, as well as the Ain Zara neighborhood on its eastern outskirts. Meanwhile, a new UN committee has begun monitoring sanctions imposed on Libya. Portuguese Ambassador Jose Filipe Moraes Cabral, the committee's chairman, told the Security Council Monday that the committee is up and running and has met twice.
