Libyan rebels welcome the use of US drones

• We hope talks will bring some relief to the people of Misrata, says group’s spokesman

Benghazi, Friday

Insurgents pinned down in their bid to oust Muammar Gaddafi welcomed today a US decision to deploy armed drones over Libya, as Senator John McCain arrived for talks with the rebel leadership.

“We are so pleased,” media liaison official for the rebels’ National Transitional Council, Mustafa Gheriani, told AFP in Benghazi.

“We hope that this can bring some relief to the people in Misrata,” he added, referring to the rebel-held city in western Libya which has been pounded by strongman Gaddafi’s forces for more than six weeks, leaving hundreds dead.

US President Barack Obama authorised deployment of missile-carrying drone warplanes over Libya “because of the humanitarian situation,” US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Thursday.

Libyan rebels, who on Thursday overran a post on the Tunisian border to mark their first advance in weeks against Gaddafi’s forces, have complained that civilians are being killed in places like Misrata.

“Our houses are being hit by bombs and rockets,” said 45-year-old Ibrahim Issa Abu Hajjar, who fled Misrata with hundreds of civilians aboard a Turkish ferry that docked on Thursday in Benghazi, the rebels’ eastern stronghold.

“We want the allies to stop Gaddafi’s forces from taking the city.”

Unmanned drones will give Nato commanders precision capabilities to strike targets that are “nestling up against crowded areas,” said US General James Cartwright, vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“Now you have the intermixing of the lines, so it’s very difficult to pick friend from foe,” Cartwright said. “A vehicle like the Predator (drone) that can get down lower and get IDs helps us.”

Their first deployment was slated for Thursday but it was called off because of bad weather.

Libya’s deputy foreign minister Khaled Kaim slammed the deployment of drones.

“They will kill more civilians,” Kaim told BBC radio.

“This is very sad ... they are claiming they are supporting democracy, (but) supporting democracy, I think, is helping people to sit together and talk together and have a serious dialogue for the future.

“It’s for the Libyans” to decide their future “not by air strikes and sending money to the rebels,” he said.

McCain, who has lobbied for greater US involvement in a UN-mandated Nato air campaign aimed at preventing Gaddafi’s forces attacking civilians, arrived in Benghazi early today, an AFP reporter said.

He was mobbed when he paid a visit to the rebels’ headquarters in the centre of the city by a crowd of about 50 people, who chanted, “Libya free, Gaddafi go away — thank you America, thank you Obama.”

McCain is the highest-ranking US politician to visit Libya’s rebel-held east since a popular uprising against Gaddafi’s rule began in mid-February. (AFP)