Gaddafi’s son vows resistance: Fugitive Libyan leader Col. Muammar Gaddafi’s fugitive son, Seif al-Islam Gaddafi has denied the claims by a transitional government official that the rebel fighters had cornered Col. Muammar Gaddafi somewhere in a desert stronghold 150 miles from Tripoli. In a broadcast on the Al Rai television channel of Syria and other Arab media, Gaddafi’s son said that their leadership is fine and victory is near .“We are drinking tea and coffee.” Seif al-Islam is quoted in NYT.
Seif al-Islam’s statement sharply contrasted that of his brother, Saadi, who on Wednesday called for negotiations on behalf of Gaddafi’s regime. Meanwhile, international representatives from some 60 countries are gathering in Paris on the Libya issue.
US officials aided Gaddafi: Al Jazeera reports that its news producer Jamal Elshayyal accessed secret documents and meeting minutes at Libya’s intelligence agency headquarters indicating that influential Americans David Welch, former assistant secretary of state under George W Bush and US congressman Denis Kucinich have been advising the fugitive Libyan leader.
Welch was at the height of restoring diplomatic relations between the US and Libya in 2008 and Kucinich publicly opposed US policy on Libya. But commenting on these developments, Aljazeera reports that a US state department official said that Welch is a private citizen who was on a private trip adding that he did not carry “any messages from the US government”.
Welch has yet to respond to Al Jazeera’s requests for comment. On the other hand Kucinich issued a statement to the Atlantic Wire stating saying that all the documents found by Aljazeera prove is that “the Libyans were reading the Washington Post… I can’t help what the Libyans put in their files… Any implication I was doing anything other than trying to bring an end to an unauthorised war is fiction.”
Nigerian bombers blame U.N. for ‘oppression’ of Muslims: The Nigerian Islamic militant group Boko Haram says that it was the bombing of the United Nations offices in Abuja last week because the world body is a global partner “in the oppression of believers,” CNN quoted a spokesman for the group.
The Aug.26 car bombing claimed 23 lives and left over 80 others injured. Boko Haram spokesman Abul Qaqa told CNN in a phone interview that the U.N. is the bastion of the global oppression of Muslims all over the world adding that they have warned everyone to steer clear of such places.
The Hearing for Zuma’s rival Julius Malema will continue at South Africa ruling party’s African National Congress headquarters in Johannesburg despite fierce clashes by his supporters and the police. Following the clashes, the party had resolved to disciplinary hearing in which Malema is accused of causing disrepute to the party to a secret venue outside the city but party spokesman, Jackson Mthembu, said on Wednesday that the decision had been reversed and the hearings would continue at party’s headquarters.
The hearing that followed reports that a South African police unit, the Hawks was investigating Malema’s lucrative financial dealings has potential to sway both Malema’s own political career and that of President Jacob Zuma before party elections next year according to NYT.
Malema has increasingly became a thorn in the party’s fresh with his calls to “nationalize mines and banks and to seize white-owned farmland” that have often won him the attention of the country’s youth whom he tells that “they are missing out on the economic fruits of political freedom”.
