Allies Show Divisions on Libya
Coalition Tries To Ease Concerns, U.N Security Council to meet on Libya Monday
SAM DAGHER in Tripoli, YAROSLAV TROFIMOV in Benghazi, Libya, and LAURENCE NORMAN in Brussels
The U.S. and its allies intensified air attacks against forces loyal to Col. Moammar Gadhafi Monday. Nathan Hodge has details from Washington and Sam Dagher reports from Tripoli, Libya.
The U.S. and its allies continued to patrol the no-fly zone over Libya on Monday but launched no new strikes, as coalition officials work to ease divisions about the military intervention launched over the weekend.
European Union foreign ministers remained at odds over the strikes in Libya even while the 27-nation bloc said it was considering further sanctions on Col. Moammar Gadhafi's regime.
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On their way into a meeting in Brussels, German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle was one of several to strike a note of caution over the military action, saying he still sees considerable "risks" from the intervention.
Catherine Ashton, the EU's High Representative for Foreign Affairs, said Monday's meeting of foreign ministers will look at "what more the EU can do in terms of our economic sanctions, our political support and of course the humanitarian issues" in Libya.
She said the EU's key task was to provide "deep long-term support" to Libya's people to help them toward "freedom and democracy."
The U.K.'s Europe Minister David Lidington said those countries involved in the intervention will continue until there is clear evidence that Gadhafi's regime has stopped firing on civilians.
"We have already had one declaration of a ceasefire that turned out to be false. We're going to judge him by his deeds and not just by his words," he said.
The coalition strikes over the weekend have scattered troops loyal to Col. Gadhafi and stopped the offensive to crush rebel forces in the stronghold of Benghazi. But the operation, and the extent of the involvement by the coalition has raised criticism from China and Russia, who requested a closed-door meeting of the United Nations Security Council Monday in New York.
With targeted air strikes that pummeled troops loyal to Moammar Gadhafi, the international coalition easily created a no-fly zone in Libya's north. WSJ's Neil Hickey reports from Washington.
Libyan leader Muammar Gadhafi says airstrikes on Libya by Western countries amounted to terrorism and said he would defeat his enemies. Video Courtesy of Reuters.
Burnt out vehicles and bodies are strewn across a strategic road on the outskirts of Benghazi after Western powers use air strikes to target Gadhafi's forces. Video Courtesy of Reuters.
The international military intervention in Libya is likely to last "a while," a top French official told the Associated Press Monday, echoing Col. Gadhafi's warning of a long war ahead as rebels, energized by the strikes on their opponents, said they were fighting to reclaim a city under siege from the Libyan leader's forces.
Burned-out tanks and personnel carriers littered the main desert road leading southwest from Benghazi, the rebel's capital in the east of the country, the remains of a pro-Gadhafi force that had been besieging the city until it was pounded by international strikes the past two nights.
Rebel fighters in Benghazi had now pushed down that highway to the outskirts of the city of Ajdabiya, which pro-Gadhafi forces have surrounded and been pounding with artillery and strikes since last week, the AP reported.
The rebels swept into the nearby oil port of Zwitina, just northeast of the city, which was also the scene of heavy fighting last week, according to the AP.
Col. Gadhafi is not a target of the campaign, a senior military official told the AP, but he could not guarantee the Libyan leader's safety. A cruise missile attack blasted Gadhafi's residential compound late Sunday, hitting a military command and control center, two U.S. officials told the AP.
Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb also said the military action to impose a no-fly-zone were right.
U.S. military authorities were moving to hand control of the operation to its allies in the coalition, though no precise timetable for such a handoff has been specified, the AP said.
Despite the success of the military strikes to halt the advance of Col. Gadhafi's forces, the coalition remains at odds with regards to Libya.
The U.N. Security Council will hold closed-door consultations on the situation in Libya later on Monday, diplomats said.
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On the Ground in Libya
![[SB10001424052748703858404576214412120987404]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-ND300_0321li_D_20110321091441.jpg)
Libyan army soldiers stood on a building, destroyed in what the government said was a western missile attack, inside Bab Al-Aziziyah, Col. Gadhafi's heavily fortified Tripoli compound Monday.
Battle for Benghazi
![[SB10001424052748704021504576210673051738638]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-NC928_0319li_D_20110319131405.jpg)
The discussion, which will follow previously scheduled consultations on Sudan on Monday afternoon, was called by China, which is this month's council president, in response to a letter from Libya and a Russian request, a diplomat said.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Monday called the resolution "defective and flawed" and likened it to medieval calls for crusades. But Russia passed up the opportunity to veto the resolution last Thursday and simply abstained, as did China, which has also criticized the air strikes on Libya
The head of the Arab League, a group whose endorsement of a no-fly zone gave political cover for U.S. and European action in a Muslim country, criticized the airstrikes as outside of the U.N. mandate.
China, meanwhile, "expressed regret" over the use of military force even as it decided last week not to block authorization of the strikes at the U.N. China's rare acquiescence moved it further away from its longstanding foreign policy based on nonintervention.
While Mr. Obama and European leaders have called on Col. Gadhafi to leave office, the U.N. authorized force only to protect civilians. U.S. commanders are counting on the air attacks and no-fly zone to spark an uprising in Col. Gadhafi's inner circle.
Obama administration officials and military commanders haven't explained what would happen if Col. Gadhafi instead consolidated power in areas he already holds.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters Sunday afternoon he wouldn't want to see Libya permanently split into government and rebel zones.
"Having states in the region begin to break up because of internal differences I think is a formula for real instability in the future," Mr. Gates said during a flight to Russia for security talks.
Libya should attack Qatar. "Let's kill the Qatari people," said Khalid Salem Anbia, 32 years old. "For every one of our martyrs, we will take 20-30 Qataris."
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