World leaders urge Gadhafi to surrender

Aug 22, 2011
By Kathy Chu, USA TODAY

Rebels in Tajura, a suburb of Tripoli, celebrating the control, the entire area Tajoura, in the early morning on Monday, August 22, 2011. PHOTO: AFP

With the 42-year regime of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi on the verge of collapse Sunday, world leaders urged the embattled leader to immediately surrender while pledging their support to the North African country in what could be a difficult transition to democracy.

Sunday, rebel forces from the Transitional National Council swept into Tripoli and seized symbolic Green Square. Gadhafi's whereabouts were unknown, although Libya's state TV channel quoted the leader as saying he planned to stay "until the end."

It's a power reversal that a few weeks ago seemed far from the rebels' grasp, as Gadhafi's forces fended off repeated attacks around the capital city.

Reacting to the events, President Obama said that "momentum against the Qadhafi regime has reached a tipping point," and "Tripoli is slipping from the grasp of a tyrant."

In London, 10 Downing Street released a statement saying the "end is near" for Gadhafi, whom the U.K. said has "committed appalling crimes against the people of Libya."

Earlier, as rebel forces surrounded Tripoli, French President Nicolas Sarkozy urged Gadhafi to "spare his people further useless suffering" by stepping down. He also said that France would give its "full support to complete the liberation of their country from oppression and dictatorship."

Gadhafi's allies, including Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have criticized the air strikes in Libya by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Chavez blasted the West Sunday for "destroying Tripoli with their bombs," Agence France-Presse reported.

Gadhafi is the Arab world's longest-ruling, most erratic, most grimly fascinating leader -- presiding for 42 years over this North African desert republic with vast oil reserves and just 6 million people. For years, he was an international pariah blamed for the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am jumbo jet over Lockerbie, Scotland, that killed 270 people. After years of denial, Gadhafi's Libya acknowledged responsibility, agreed to pay up to $10 million to relatives of each victim, and declared he would dismantle all weapons of mass destruction.

If Gadhafi is ousted, it could provide "renewed momentum (to) push Syria and Yemen past the threshold to more democratic regimes," said Daniel Serwer, a professor at John Hopins' School of Advanced International Studies. "That could inspire serious reform elsewhere as well."

Syrian President Bashar Assad has said his regime is in no danger of collapse and warned against any foreign military intervention in his country as the regime tries to crush a 5-month-old popular uprising. In his fourth public appearance since the revolt against his family's 40-year rule erupted in mid-March, Assad insists that security forces are making inroads against the uprising. Rights groups charge Assad's forces routinely open fire on unarmed protesters, killing more than 2,000.

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