French President pledges to help Libyan opposition in fight against 41-year rule of Moammar Gaddafi
France promised Libyan revolutionists on Wednesday it would intensify air strikes on Muammar Gaddafi's forces and send military liaison officers to help them as fighting raged in the besieged city of Misrata.
President Nicolas Sarkozy pledged stronger military action at his first meeting with the leader of the opposition Libyan National Council, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, the Elysee presidential office said in a statement. "We are indeed going to intensify the attacks and respond to this request from the national transition council," it said, quoting Sarkozy as telling Abdel Jalil: "We will help you."
Sarkozy did not say how NATO-led forces planned to break a stalemate on the ground after the United States and some European allies declined last week to join ground strikes.
Abdel Jalil told reporters he had invited Sarkozy to pay a visit to the oppostion-held eastern city of Benghazi to demonstrate France's support for ending Gaddafi's 41-year rule. "I think that would be extremely important for the morale of the revolution," he said. France did not say if the president had accepted.
Abdel Jalil also said the opposition, little known to the world until an uprising against Gaddafi began in mid-February, was committed to building a democracy in Libya where the head of state would come to power "by the ballot box, not atop a tank."
Meanwhile, revolutionists said they fought pro-government troops for control of a main thoroughfare in the port city that is their last stronghold in the west of the country. Eight people had been killed the previous day, mostly civilians.
Hundreds of people are believed to have been killed in Misrata, where aid groups say the humanitarian situation is worsening with a lack of food and medical supplies.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said the Libyan government's reported use of cluster munitions and heavy weapons in Misrata may amount to a war crime under international law.
