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From hiding, beleaguered
Gaddafi vows to fight on Rebels celebrate after overrunning Muammar Gaddafi’s Bab al-Azizya compound (top) in Tripoli on Tuesday; and (below) a picture dated Feb 5, 2011, of the Libyan leader with the iconic golden fist statue in the background, depicting a fist crushing a US jet fighter after Gaddafi’s former residence was bombed in 1986 by US aircraft. — AFP |
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North Korea ready to discuss N-moratorium
MP’s brothel bill threatens Oz govt
Facebook to overhaul privacy settings
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From hiding, beleaguered
Gaddafi vows to fight on
Tripoli, August 24 Rebels ransacked Gaddafi’s Bab al-Azizya bastion, seizing arms and smashing symbols of a ruler whose fall will transform Libya and rattle other Arab autocrats facing popular uprisings. Gaddafi said the withdrawal from his headquarters in the heart of the capital was a tactical move after it had been hit by 64 NATO air strikes and he vowed “martyrdom” or victory in his six-month war against the Western alliance and Libyan foes. Urging Libyans to cleanse the streets of traitors, he said he had secretly toured Tripoli. “I have been out a bit in Tripoli discreetly, without being seen by people, and ... I did not feel that Tripoli was in danger,” Gaddafi told loyalist media outlets. His whereabouts after leaving the compound, perhaps via a tunnel network to adjoining districts, remain unknown, although he appears to have been in Tripoli, at least until recently. Rebels said fighting was still going on near the Rixos hotel, where armed Gaddafi loyalists have prevented foreign journalists from leaving, and in eastern areas of the city. A Reuters reporter near the hotel around midday today heard rifle fire and heavy anti-aircraft guns, which have been used by both sides against ground targets. But Gaddafi was already history in the eyes of the rebels and their political leaders planned high-level talks in Qatar on Wednesday with envoys of the United States, Britain, France, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates on the way ahead. Another meeting was scheduled for Thursday in Istanbul. China urged a "stable transition of power" in Libya and said today it was in contact with the rebel council, the clearest sign yet that Beijing has effectively shifted recognition to forces poised to defeat Gaddafi. — Reuters Dead or alive: Rebels offer $1.6 mn for Gaddafi Benghazi: Libyan rebels put a price of two million dinars ($1.67 million) on the head of strongman Muammar Gaddafi, dead or alive, the head of the Transitional National Council said today. “The NTC supports the initiative of businessmen who are offering two million dinars for the capture of Moamer Gaddafi, dead or alive,” Mustafa Abdel Jalil said in Tripoli. Also, Abdel Jalil offered amnesty to “members of (Gaddafi’s) close circle who kill him or capture him.” — AFP
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North Korea ready to discuss N-moratorium Sosnovy Bor (Russia), Aug 24 The pledge, made during talks with President Dmitry Medvedev, appeared intended to increase the chances of reviving the six-nation aid-for-disarmament talks which collapsed when North Korea walked out of them in 2008. “Kim Jong-il expressed readiness to return to six-party talks without preconditions,” Medvedev’s spokeswoman, Natalya Timakova, said after the president met Kim at a military base in the Siberian town of Sosnovy Bor near Lake Baikal. “In the course of the talks, the North Koreans will be ready to resolve the issue of imposing a moratorium on testing and production of missile and nuclear weaponry.” The reclusive North Korean leader, who arrived in nearby Ulan-Ude on Tuesday in an armoured train on his first talks in Russia since 2002, did not speak to reporters after the talks some 4,420 km east of Moscow. The United States and South Korea have called on North Korea to agree to a moratorium before the six-party talks reconvene. But Timakova’s comments suggested Kim wanted no discussion of the moratorium before a resumption of the talks, in which Russia, China and Japan are also involved. The talks are intended to provide impoverished and secretive North Korea with economic aid as an incentive for giving up its nuclear weapons programme. Moscow and Beijing have called for a quick resumption of talks. Seoul, Washington and Tokyo say they are willing to resume the talks where they left off, but that Pyongyang must show it is serious about denuclearising. — Reuters
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MP’s brothel bill threatens Oz govt Canberra, August 24 The move by the Health Services Union (HSU) increases the likelihood that the police will launch a criminal investigation into the credit card bills of the union’s former boss Craig Thomson, now a government MP, including payments to a Sydney brothel. Thomson has denied any wrongdoing. But if police decides, he can be charged with a criminal offence of which he is then found guilty, he would be forced to leave Parliament, sparking a by-election that could bring down Gillard’s government which has a one-seat majority. The union had previously not complained about Thomson’s credit card bills, which meant the police had limited scope to investigate the payments. But on Wednesday, union’s new national secretary Kathy Jackson said the union had now referred Thomson’s credit card use to the police in the New South Wales state. — Reuters
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Facebook to overhaul privacy settings Houston, August 24 The revamped privacy standards mark the social networking giant's latest effort to improve safeguards around personal information of the site's more than 750 million users. The new privacy settings might also be a response to Google+, the social networking site that has won rave reviews for its privacy controls when it was launched by rival Google Inc less than two months ago, and which is considered a potential competitor to Facebook. The revamped privacy settings will enable users to review a photo in which they have been tagged before it appears online. Presently, the users can add their friends name to a photo on the site without their consent or knowledge. — Reuters
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A beleaguered Muammar Gaddafi vowed today to fight on to death or victory after jubilant rebels forced him to abandon his Tripoli stronghold in an apparently decisive blow against the Libyan leader’s 42-year rule.
Sosnovy Bor (Russia), Aug 24 
Canberra, August 24 
