(New York Times) Kareem Fahim and David D. Kirkpatrick - Col. Muammar Gaddafi of Libya tightened his grip on the capital, Tripoli, on Tuesday after a bloody crackdown, as the eastern half of the country was slipping beyond his control. After a televised speech by Gaddafi, thousands of his supporters converged in the city's central Green Square, where many were loaded into trucks and sent to conduct searches for demonstrators. Witnesses said that on Monday, groups of heavily armed militiamen and mercenaries from other African countries cruised the streets in pickup trucks, spraying crowds with machine-gun fire.
2011-02-23 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive