South African president Jacob Zuma flew into Tripoli today to try to broker a peace deal with Muammar Gadafy, just hours after Nato's secretary-general said the Libyan leader's "reign of terror" was coming to an end.
In Rome, eight Libyan army officers including five generals appeared at an Italian government-arranged news conference, saying they were part of a group of as many as 120 military officials and soldiers who defected from Gadafy in recent days.
Libya's ambassador to the United Nations, Mr Abdurrahman Shalgam, who has also defected from Gadafy, said all 120 of the military personnel were outside Libya now but he did not say where they were.
On arrival in Tripoli Mr Zuma was met by a host of dignitaries, but not Col Gadafy himself, who has not been seen since May 11 when he was shown by Libyan state television meeting what it said were tribal leaders.
President Zuma's walk down the red carpet at Tripoli airport was accompanied by a band and children chanting "We want Gadafy!" in English while waving Libyan flags and pictures of the leader.
Mr Zuma's visit is his second since the conflict began in February. His previous trip made little progress because Col Gadafy has refused to relinquish power, while rebel leaders say that is a precondition for any truce.
Nato warplanes have been raising the pace of their air strikes on Tripoli, with Col Gadafy's Bab al-Aziziyah compound in the centre of the city being hit repeatedly.
Journalists escorted into Bab Al-Aziziyah after Mr Zuma's arrival found a group of around 160 African visitors to Libya chanting pro-Gadafy slogans and waving flags of nations including Chad, Niger and Ghana, in an apparent show of pan-African unity.
Britain said yesterday it was to add "bunker-busting" bombs to the arsenal its warplanes are using over Libya, a weapon it said would send a message to Col Gadafy that it was time to quit.
"Our operation in Libya is achieving its objectives ... We have seriously degraded Gadafy's ability to kill his own people," Nato secretary-general Anders Fogh Rasmussen told a Nato forum in Varna, Bulgaria.
"Gadafy's reign of terror is coming to an end. He is increasingly isolated at home and abroad. Even those closest to him are departing, defecting or deserting." Col Gadafy denies attacking civilians, saying his forces were obliged to act to contain armed criminal gangs and al Qaeda militants.
He says the Nato intervention is an act of colonial aggression aimed at taking control of Libya's plentiful oil reserves.
Rebels control the east of Libya around the city of Benghazi, Libya's third-biggest city Misrata, and a mountain range stretching from the town of Zintan, 150 km south of Tripoli, towards the border with Tunisia.
Helped by Nato air support, the rebels have been able to repel attacks by pro-Gadafy forces but in many places they are still under bombardment and cut off from supplies.
Libyan state television reported that NATO air strikes killed 13 people in Zlitan today the next town westwards on the coast road towards Tripoli from Misrata.
The state news agency Jana also reported that NATO air strikes hit the Tiji area, near the Western Mountain town of Nalut, overnight, causing "human and material losses".
Reuters