http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/27/world/middleeast/libya-leader-wants-nato-presence-through-2011.html

October 26, 2011

Libya's Interim Leader Asks NATO to Stay Through the End of 2011

By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and RICK GLADSTONE

TRIPOLI, Libya -- Libya's interim leader said Wednesday that he had asked NATO to prolong its air patrols through December and add military advisers on the ground, despite his official declaration on Sunday of the country's liberation after the killing of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi.

"We have asked NATO to stay until the end of the year, and it certainly has the international legitimacy to remain in Libya to protect the civilians from Qaddafi loyalists," the interim leader, Mustafa Abdel-Jalil, chairman of the Transitional National Council, said in an interview with the pan-Arab news channel Al Jazeera.

"Qaddafi still has supporters in neighboring countries, and we fear those loyalists could be launching attacks against us and infiltrating our borders," he said. "We need technical support and training for our troops on the ground. We also need communications equipment, and we need aerial intelligence to monitor our borders."

Mr. Abdel-Jalil was interviewed while attending a Libyan aid conference in Doha, Qatar. He spoke as NATO was preparing within days to formally end its operations in Libya and as the country enters a treacherous new phase in its post-Qaddafi transformation.

NATO's airstrikes enabled a disparate alliance of loosely organized and undisciplined revolutionary militias to defeat Colonel Qaddafi's forces in a bloody, eight-month civil war. But the former rebels' civilian leaders have not yet unified their disparate militias under a single command, and Mr. Abdel-Jalil's request for military advisers on the ground may have been meant to address that challenge.

The credibility of the Transitional National Council has suffered from its implausible explanations for the apparent assassination of Colonel Qaddafi after his capture last week. And the geographic and ideological factions among the revolutionaries have yet to agree on a new interim leadership team even as Prime Minister Mahmoud Jibril prepares to step aside within a month.

"I must say it will be difficult for all Libyans to agree on one person for a prime minister," Mr. Abdel-Jalil acknowledged in the interview, though he added that the transitional council had "a number of options."

"I hope we can come up with a name that will have the backing of most Libyans," he said.

NATO ministers last week tentatively set Monday as the end of their military operations in Libya, which were conducted under the auspices of a United Nations Security Council resolution to protect Libyan civilians from reprisals by Colonel Qaddafi's military during the conflict.

The NATO ministers had been scheduled to meet on Wednesday in Brussels to finalize the termination date, but they abruptly postponed that meeting until Friday, presumably to weigh Mr. Abdel-Jalil's request for an extension.

Qatar, one of the first Arab countries to recognize the coalition of anti-Qaddafi rebels, also disclosed for the first time on Wednesday that it had deployed hundreds of soldiers in Libya to help them.

In an interview at the aid meeting in Doha, Qatar's military chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Hamad bin Ali al-Atiya, said that the Qataris had been "running the training and communication operations" of the anti-Qaddafi forces in Libya, Agence France-Presse reported.

Previously, Qatar had said only that it was providing some air support, water, weapons and hundreds of millions of dollars worth of other aid to the rebels. Qatar's willingness to play an aggressive role in the internal Libyan conflict was an unusual departure in Qatari foreign policy.

Many rebels displayed a special gratitude to Qatar, even flying Qatari flags along with their rebel flag in some towns in the western Nafusah Mountains. Some Libyan liberals, however, have harbored suspicions, suggesting that conservatives in the Qatari government may have steered their training and resources toward Islamists among the rebels, like Abdel Hakim Belhaj, a Qatari-trained fighter who emerged as the head of Tripoli's military council.

The interim Libyan government, meanwhile, continued on Wednesday to hunt for Seif al-Islam el-Qaddafi, one of the colonel's sons and a onetime heir apparent who is now the last member of the former ruling family still on the loose. Among Colonel Qaddafi's other children, Mohammed, Saadi and Aisha have fled to neighboring African countries. Two sons who led militias, Khamis and Muatassim, have been killed.

There was an unconfirmed report Wednesday that an official of Libya's interim government had said Seif al-Islam was preparing to turn himself over to the International Criminal Court, where he is accused of war crimes. But other officials and the court said they had no such information.

Speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of harassment by anti-Qaddafi forces, a person close to the Qaddafi family said Seif al-Islam's surrender at this time was extremely unlikely.

David D. Kirkpatrick reported from Tripoli, and Rick Gladstone from New York. Adam Nossiter contributed reporting from Tripoli.