Snipers halt NTC fight for Gaddafi hometown

Fighters for Libya's new rulers were Friday forced to regroup on the edge of Sirte, halted by pro-Kadhafi snipers in their two-week old assault on the ousted despot's hometown. And in Bani Walid, the only other stronghold of forces loyal to Moamer Kadhafi, the National Transitional Council fighters appeared to have opened another front. As the NTC forces faced stiff resistance on the battlefield, doubts grew that Kadhafi's vocal spokesman Mussa Ibrahim had been captured after reports he had been seized while disguised as a woman, complete with veil. AFP correspondents on fronts east and west of Sirte said that the former rebels had made no advances on Friday. But in some of the fiercest fighting for days, the NTC fighters pounded Sirte with 106mm anti-tank guns, rocket-launchers and machineguns, while Kadhafi loyalists hit back with mortar, machinegun and sniper fire. Two NTC fighters were wounded by shrapnel, medics in a field hospital on the city's western edge said as NATO warplanes and drones flew overhead without launching any strikes. Elsewhere in Sirte, NTC fighters held the line at the eastern edge of the city amid some sporadic artillery shelling and gunfire, an AFP correspondent said.  "If we want we can destroy Sirte completely. We have enough ammunition and shells to fight for 10 years," said Nasser Obeidi, leader of a group operating four Russian-built 130mm artillery canons. "But we are allowing civilians to leave the city before we start a big assault. People are leaving the city daily, sometimes in large numbers," he told AFP. He acknowledged, however, that Kadhafi forces had deployed snipers in the city which was troubling the fighters. "There are snipers deployed by Kadhafi's men inside the city. They are targeting even civilian cars who are leaving the city," said Obeidi. The lack of progress in the battle for Sirte was also making the situation more and more precarious for civilians caught in the crossfire since the NTC forces began their offensive to take the coastal city. Only around 15 cars were seen leaving Sirte's eastern gate as NTC fighters looked on from the same positions they held the day before, an AFP correspondent reported. Columns of NTC fighters backed by tanks had on September 15 launched their assault to take Sirte, the fugitive Kadhafi's birthplace. But after making inroads by claiming the city's strategic port, airport and military air base over the past week, they appealed for more NATO air strikes this week.  In Bani Walid, a heavy barrage of rockets and artillery hit NTC positions from the west, joining other fire that has been coming for days from the south. "Today is the most intense attack we have faced since we came here," said NTC field commander Abdelbaset Tarhauni, as NATO fighter jets buzzed overhead. An AFP correspondent saw one dead and six wounded NTC fighters from the attacks. Meanwhile, Libya's new rulers were probing the whereabouts of Kadhafi's spokesman Mussa Ibrahim, as one television channel said it would air footage of him being detained in women's clothing. NTC commanders said late Thursday they received reports from fighters on the ground that Ibrahim had been seized outside Sirte, where his loyalists have been under siege for the past week. But the fighters' high command in Libya's third-largest city Misrata said it was unable to confirm the capture of Ibrahim, who has kept up a steady stream of pro-Kadhafi broadcasts from unknown locations while on the run. "Misrata fighters contacted us and gave us the information that Mussa Ibrahim has been captured," said Mustafa bin Dardef of the NTC's Zintan Brigade.  Another commander, Mohammed al-Marimi, said: "Mussa Ibrahim was captured while driving outside Sirte by fighters from Misrata." However, a spokesman for the Misrata Military Council, Adel Ibrahim, told AFP: "If the Misrata fighters had captured him, they would have told us." Council member Juma bin Wafa, who was in the operations room until 4:00 am (0200 GMT), said: "I have heard nothing about this." And a pro-Kadhafi website also denied his long-time spokesman had been taken. "Mussa Ibrahim has not been captured," the website of the former state television channel Allibiya said. "This is a mendacious rumour aimed at distracting attention from the rebels'... defeat at the hands of the heroic forces in Sirte." NTC efforts to secure the extradition of fugitive members of Kadhafi's family and inner circle, meanwhile, took a blow with a rebuff from neighbouring Niger to an arrest notice issued by global police agency Interpol for the toppled strongman's playboy son Saadi. Niger Prime Minister Brigi Rafini said his government had no plans for the time being to hand over Saadi, 38, who has been under house arrest in the capital Niamey since fleeing across the desert border on September 11. Interpol said in a statement from its Lyon headquarters that Saadi was wanted "for allegedly misappropriating properties through force and armed intimidation when he headed the Libyan Football Federation." Niger has confirmed it has a total of 32 Kadhafi loyalists on its soil, including three generals, saying it allowed them entry for "humanitarian reasons." The whereabouts of Kadhafi himself remain a mystery, although he has issued repeated statements vowing to die a martyr rather than flee his homeland. Libya's new leaders suspect that two of his sons -- Mutassim and Seif al-Islam -- are still inside the country, the former in Sirte and the latter in his loyalists' other significant remaining bastion, the desert city of Bani Walid. NATO said on Friday that its warplanes had hit two targets in Sirte and two in Bani Walid. At Bani Walid, NTC fighters continued to face heavy resistance from pro-Kadhafi forces controlling the city. On the political front, Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini arrived in Tripoli on a one-day visit aimed at rebuilding Rome's close diplomatic and economic ties with its former colony.