Libya: Doha Summit Supports Rebels

By Staff writer

DOHA---After three weeks of Nato-led air strikes, delegates representing Arab, African nations, NATO and a number of international organizations, met at a summit in Qatar Wednesday, closing ranks to issue a first unanimous call for Gaddafi to step down. The delegation boasted that they were "united and firm in their resolve" about the outcome of the crisis – or, at least, more than they were at the London conference late last month.

The meeting was chaired by British Foreign Secretary William Hague and the Qatari Prime Minister, Hamed bin Jassem. United Nations Secretary-General Ban ki Moon represented the United Nations and also in attendance was Moussa Koussa, Libya's former foreign minister who became the most prominent member of Gaddafi's regime to defect when he fled to London last month.

At the end of the one day summit, the group issued a statement calling for Gaddafi to step down. "Gaddafi and his regime has lost all legitimacy and he must leave power allowing the Libyan people to determine their own future," it said.

They coalesced behind the Libyan rebels promising more humanitarian aid and money channeled through a temporary trust fund of sorts.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon at the summit stressed the vital need for united global action to tackle the ongoing crisis in Libya, where fighting between pro- and anti-Government forces rages on and the humanitarian situation is worsening, as well as to assist with the recovery once the conflict has ended.

“It is critical that the international community act in concert, that we speak with one voice, and that we continue to work in common cause on behalf of the Libyan people,” Mr. Ban told the meeting of the International Contact Group on Libya, which met  in Doha, Qatar.

International efforts on Libya shift to Cairo on Thursday when the UN's Ban joins the Arab League secretary general Amr Moussa, African Union commission chairman Jean Ping and the EU's foreign policy chief, Lady Ashton. That meeting is expected to discuss a Turkish "roadmap" for peace under which Gaddafi's forces would withdraw from besieged cities such as Misrata. But that would evidently require the agreement of the government in Tripoli.

The Doha meeting follows an effort earlier this week by the African Union to forge a peace plan that had been accepted in principle by Gadhafi. Ghoga and fellow rebel leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil rejected it on grounds that it did not provide any solutions to violence against the Libyan people.