BENGHAZI, Libya, Aug 30: Libyan rebels moving in for the kill against pockets of loyalist resistance have given a Saturday ultimatum for Moamer Kadhafi´s forces to surrender or face a military onslaught.
National Transitional Council (NTC) chief Mustafa Abdel Jalil told reporters in the rebel stronghold Benghazi Tuesday that the respite was offered to mark the three-day Eid al-Fitr Muslim feast which follows the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan.[break]
"This window of opportunity will be closed at the end of Eid al-Fitr (Friday in Libya)," Abdel Jalil said, adding that talks were under way with officials in towns including Kadhafi´s birthplace Sirte to arrange their peaceful surrender.
"From Saturday, if no peaceful solution is in sight on the ground, we will resort to military force," Abdel Jalil warned.
Algeria meanwhile on Tuesday defended its decision to give shelter to Kadhafi´s wife and three children, as angry Libyan rebels who toppled the longtime strongman demanded they be returned for trial.
Algerian foreign ministry spokesman Amar Belani told AFP the decision to allow Kadhafi´s wife Safiya, daughter Aisha and sons Mohammed and Hannibal to cross into the country on Monday was based solely on humanitarian concerns.
"These people have been admitted to Algeria for strictly humanitarian reasons," Belani said, adding that UN chief Ban Ki-moon, the Security Council and number two leader of the rebels´ NTC, Mahmud Jibril, had been informed.
Just hours after crossing over, daughter Aisha gave birth to a girl, Algerian authorities announced Tuesday.
The NTC, already at odds with Algiers for its refusal to recognise it as the legitimate authority in Libya, had reacted angrily when news broke Monday that some of their quarry had fled.
"We´d like those persons to come back," NTC spokesman Mahmud Shammam said in Tripoli, adding that Algeria had given the family members "a pass" to enter a third country.
"Saving Kadhafi´s family is not an act we welcome and understand," Shammam told a press conference in Tripoli.
"We can assure our neighbours that we want better relations with them ... but we are determined to arrest and try the Kadhafi family and Kadhafi himself," Shammam went on, saying the rebels guaranteed a "fair trial."
So far Algeria has not recognised the NTC and has adopted a stance of strict neutrality on the Libyan conflict, leading some among the rebels to accuse it of supporting the Kadhafi regime.
There has been no word on the whereabouts of Kadhafi himself, who went into hiding when rebel forces overran his Tripoli headquarters a week ago.
Italian news agency ANSA, citing "authoritative Libyan diplomatic sources," said he and his sons Saadi and Seif al-Islam were holed-up in the town of Bani Walid, south of the capital Tripoli.
Rebel Libyan justice minister Mohammed al-Allagy told AFP that Kadhafi´s youngest son Khamis, whose death has been announced several times since Libya´s conflict erupted but never confirmed, may have been killed south of Tripoli and buried on Monday.
Khamis, 28, commanded a brigade seen as the most effective and loyal force of the Libyan leader.
NATO said Tuesday its military mission in Libya was still necessary and would continue as long as Kadhafi´s forces threatened civilians.
"Despite the fall of the Kadhafi regime and the gradual return of security ... NATO´s mission is not finished yet," Colonel Roland Lavoie, the operation´s military spokesman, told a news briefing in Brussels.
The Western alliance earlier said its warplanes had fired a new barrage of bombs against Kadhafi forces holed up in Sirte, 360 kilometres (225 miles) east of Tripoli.
It said it destroyed 22 vehicles mounted with weapons, four radars, three command and control nodes, one anti-aircraft missile system and one surface-to-air missile system in the town´s vicinity on Monday.
In Tripoli, Ahmed al-Tharaht, the NTC´s official in charge of interior affairs, said rebels controlling the Libyan capital will be disarmed as quickly as possible.
"We will remove the weapons that are on the streets," and the plan will be quickly implemented, Tharaht said.
Disarmed rebels will be given the choice of joining the "national army" or the security forces, he added.
On the ground, rebel reinforcements were arriving on Tuesday at Bin Jawad, 100 kilometres (60 miles) east of Sirte, an AFP reporter said.
Occasional explosions could be heard from near Nofilia, a desert hamlet just inland from Bin Jawad, while rebel T-55 tanks and armoured vehicles rumbled towards the front line, taking up positions in the sand dunes.
Nofilia was seized by the rebels on Monday, sparking celebrations among the rebels.
"Tomorrow (Tuesday), God willing, we will continue our advance. Their morale is rock bottom," a rebel commander said of Kadhafi loyalists.
Other rebel fighters had moved to within 30 kilometres of Sirte from the west and were awaiting the reinforcements, rebel commander Mohammed al-Fortiya, told AFP on Sunday.
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