TRIPOLI: Pressure is mounting on Muammar Gaddafi from within his stronghold in the Libyan capital, with increasing NATO airstrikes and worsening shortages of fuel and goods. Residents said Thursday there has also been a wave of anti-government protests in several Tripoli neighborhoods this week – dissent that in the past has been met with zero tolerance and brutal force. Gaddafi's rebel opposition, meanwhile, received major political boosts from abroad. Britain promised to provide them with police gear, and the Obama administration invited a rebel delegation to the White House for talks Friday. Those announcements followed a new round of NATO airstrikes early Thursday that hit Gaddafi's fortified compound in Tripoli. Just hours beforehand, the Libyan leader had appeared on state TV for the first time since his son was killed nearly two weeks ago. Before his appearance, rumors swirled that he had been killed or injured. Reporters were shown the airstrike damage by Libyan officials, including one who said Gaddafi and his family had moved away from the Bab Al-Aziziya compound some time ago. One missile appeared to have targeted some sort of underground bunker at the compound – a sprawling complex of buildings surrounded by towering concrete blast walls. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is likely to issue an arrest warrant for Gaddafi by the end of the month, ANSA news agency quoted Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini as saying Thursday. He said Gaddafi had only until the end of the month to make his exit, by going into exile for example, because an arrest warrant would change his position. NATO, which has hit the Libyan capital repeatedly this week, said Thursday's attack successfully hit “a large command and control bunker complex in downtown Tripoli that was used to coordinate attacks against civilian populations”. A local journalist and another resident in Tripoli, reached by telephone from Egypt, told the AP that there have been protests this week in at least three neighborhoods in the capital, accompanied by exchanges of gunfire between opposition activists and Gaddafi forces. The head of the rebels' transitional government, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, said during a high-level visit to London Thursday that Gaddafi opponents in Tripoli were in the process of acquiring weapons and predicted they would eventually contest regime forces in the capital. Britain said Thursday that it will supply police officers in rebel-held eastern Libya with uniforms and body armor, and help establish a public radio station. The announcement came after Prime Minister David Cameron and other ministers met in London with Mustafa Abdel-Jalil. Cameron said he had invited Abdel-Jalil to open a permanent office in London to help cement contacts with Britain. According to NATO, Gaddafi's forces dispatched a number of small speedboats to attack Misrata's port early Thursday, but they were repelled by Canadian, British and French warships on the scene. In Tripoli, Libyan government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said three people were killed in Thursday's NATO strikes – a local official and two Libyan journalists who were making a documentary about the hundreds of Libyan civilians who have been sleeping in Gaddafi's compound to show support for their leader. In an apparent effort to dispel rumors that Gaddafi himself had been killed, Libyan state TV showed him meeting tribal leaders, but did not record him speaking. To authenticate the scene, the camera zoomed in on the date on a TV monitor in the room, which read Wednesday, May 11. It was apparently recorded at the hotel where foreign correspondents must reside in Tripoli. Gaddafi did not make himself available to them. Intensified NATO airstrikes on Gaddafi's forces across Libya have given a boost to rebels fighting to oust the regime. In all, NATO said, the alliance has carried out more than 2,400 airstrikes since March 31 as part of the effort to assist the rebels and pressure Gaddafi relinquish power.
