Libya declares cease-fire after UN no-fly zone vote

TRIPOLI. Libya – Libya declared an immediate cease-fire Friday, trying to fend off international military intervention after the U.N. authorized a no-fly zone and “all necessary measures” to prevent the regime from striking its own people.

The cease-fire announcement by the Libyan foreign minister followed a fierce government attack on Misrata, the last rebel-held city in the western half of the country.

Meanwhile, a rebel spokesman said Moammar Gadhafi’s forces were still shelling two cities. Mustafa Gheriani said the attacks continued well past the announcement.

The U.N. Security Council resolution, which was passed late Thursday after weeks of deliberation, set the stage for airstrikes, a no-fly zone and other military measures short of a ground invasion.

Britain announced that it would send fighter jets, Italy offered the use of its bases, and France was making plans to deploy planes. The U.S. had yet to announce its role. NATO also held an emergency meeting.

With the international community mobilizing, Libyan Foreign Minister Moussa Koussa said the government would cease fire in line with the resolution, although he criticized the authorization of international military action, calling it a violation of Libya’s sovereignty.

“The government is opening channels for true, serious dialogue with all parties,” he said during a news conference in Tripoli, the capital. He took no questions.

In Washington, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the United States must see ‘action on the ground,’ not just words from Libya on any cease-fire.

The rebels, once confident, found themselves in danger of being crushed by an overpowering pro-Gadhafi force using rockets, artillery, tanks, warplanes. That force has advanced along the Mediterranean coast in recent days, aiming to recapture the rebel-held eastern half of Libya.

A large crowd in the Benghazi, the city where the uprising started on Feb. 15, watched the U.N. vote on an outdoor TV projection and burst into cheers, with green and red fireworks exploding overhead. In Tobruk, another eastern city, happy Libyans fired weapons in the air to celebrate.

Western powers faced pressure to act quickly as Gadhafi’s forces gained momentum. The U.S. has positioned a host of forces and ships, including submarines, destroyers, and amphibious assault and landing ships with some 400 Marines aboard. It also could provide a range of surveillance.

In an interview with Portuguese television broadcast just before the U.N. vote, Gadhafi pledged to respond harshly to U.N.-sponsored attacks. “If the world is crazy,” he said, “we will be crazy, too.”

The Libyan government closed its airspace Friday, according to Europe’s air traffic control agency, Eurocontrol.

Government tanks rolled into Misrata, 200 kilometres southeast of Tripoli, early Friday, shelling houses, hospitals and a mosque for several hours before pulling back to the city’s outskirts, witnesses said. At least six people were killed, raising the total death toll in two days of fighting to nine, a local doctor said.

Misrata is the rebels’ last western holdout after Gadhafi recaptured a string of other cities that fell to the opposition early. Its fall would leave the country largely divided, with the rebels bottled up in the east near the border with Egypt.

Gadhafi troops encircled the city of Ajdabiya, the first in the path of their march, but also had some troops positioned beyond it toward Benghazi, the second largest Libyan city, with a population of about 700,000.

Libya’s unrest began in Benghazi and spread east to Tripoli. Like others in the Mideast, the uprising started with popular demonstrations against Gadhafi, rejecting his 41 years of despotic and often brutal rule. The tone quickly changed after Gadhafi’s security in Tripoli forcefully put down the gatherings there.

Soon rebel forces began arming themselves, quickly taking control of the country’s east centred on Benghazi. Some Libyan army units joined the rebels, providing them with some firepower, but much less than Gadhafi’s remaining forces.

There are no reliable death tolls. Rebels say more than 1,000 people have been killed in a month of fighting, while Gadhafi claims the toll is only 150.