NATO set to decide when to end mission in Libya

[October 21, 2011]  BRUSSELS (AP) -- NATO's governing body meets Friday to decide when and how to end the seven-month bombing campaign in Libya, a military operation whose success has helped reinvigorate the Cold War alliance.

Meanwhile, a NATO official said commanders were not aware that Moammar Gadhafi was in the convoy that was struck Thursday in Sirte by missiles fired from a French warplane, and which led to his subsequent death.

"The convoy was a clear military target," said the official who could not be named under standing rules. "We later learned that Gadhafi was in the convoy. Therefore the strike likely contributed to his capture."

After Libya's former rebels killed Gadhafi, officials said they expected the aerial operation to end very soon. But the North Atlantic Council may also decide to keep air patrols flying for several more days until the security situation on the ground stabilizes.

The final decision will depend on the recommendation of Adm. Jim Stavridis, the supreme allied commander, and the Military Committee, the highest military organ.

NATO's Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has said, after the latest developments, the end of the campaign "has now moved much closer." He has hailed the success of the mission saying that it demonstrated that the alliance continues to play an "indispensable" role in confronting current and future security challenges.

NATO warplanes have flown about 26,000 sorties, including over 9,600 strike missions. They destroyed Libya's air defenses and over 1,000 tanks, vehicles and guns, as well as Gadhafi's command and control networks.

The daily airstrikes finally broke the stalemate that developed after Gadhafi's initial attempts failed to crush the rebellion that broke out in February. In August, the rebels began advancing on Tripoli, with the NATO warplanes providing close air support and destroying any attempts by the defenders to block them.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe told France-Info radio on Friday that the operation seems to be at an end.

"We can say that the military operation is over, that all of Libyan territory is under the control of the (interim government) and that, aside from several transitional measures in the week ahead, the NATO operation has reached the end of its term," he said.

But in London, Britain suggested that NATO may not immediately complete its mission in Libya, wary over the potential reprisal attacks by remaining Gadhafi loyalists.

"NATO will now meet to decide when the mission is complete, and once we are satisfied that there is no further threat to the Libyan civilians and the Libyans are content NATO will then arrange to wind up the operation," British Defense Secretary Philip Hammond told BBC radio on Friday.

British Prime Minister David Cameron, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and President Barack Obama also discussed the NATO campaign in a video conference late Thursday.

"They discussed the need to maintain the NATO-led operation while a threat remained to civilian life," a spokeswoman for Cameron's office said, on customary condition of anonymity.

[Associated Press; By SLOBODAN LEKIC]

Follow Slobodan Lekic on Twitter at http://twitter.com/slekich.

Associated Press writers Elaine Ganley in Paris and David Stringer in London contributed to this report.

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