Arab leaders use varying tactics to try to calm anger in the streets
By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
As fresh protests erupted across the Middle East and North Africa on Sunday, embattled leaders in the region struggled to contain their discontented masses, deploying a wide variety of tactics - from offers of dialogue to brutal crackdowns - to suppress the pro-democracy forces unleashed by the revolts in Tunisia and Egypt.
Amid deepening protests in the past few days, the Libyan government's grip on Benghazi, the second-largest city, appeared to be slipping. Security forces there opened fire on mourners attending funeral marches for 84 protesters killed the day before, their harshest response yet to the recent round of demonstrations. They also swiftly clamped down on smaller uprisings that spread to the outskirts of the capital, Tripoli, where protesters seized military bases and weapons. The outbreak of protests there signaled a new threat to the regime.
Protests also broke out Sunday in Morocco and Tunisia, posing new challenges to their rulers, while authorities in Iran and Bahrain continued to confront calls for reform.
By late Sunday, the number of those killed in the uprising across Libya had soared to at least 233, most of them in Benghazi, according to Human Rights Watch. Other news reports placed the death toll at 200 or much higher.
U.S. and European Union officials on Sunday condemned Libya's crackdown and called for an end to the violence. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said the United States is "gravely concerned" and has received "multiple credible reports that hundreds of people have been killed and injured." Many of the victims had been killed with machine guns, witnesses said.
The scope of the turmoil in Libya is impossible to verify. Authorities have denied access to foreign journalists and have periodically cut off the Internet and phone lines. But the unfolding situation in Libya could mark the most brutal attempt to suppress the anti-government protests sweeping across the Arab world.
Residents and activists describe a volatile landscape that is increasingly isolated from the world and becoming bloodier and more chaotic by the day. The protesters seek the ouster of Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi, who has ruled for more than four decades.
Gaddafi's son appeared on state television early Monday, saying his father is in the country and backed by the army. "We will fight to the last minute, until the last bullet," Seif al-Islam Gaddafi said, warning that if the unrest continues, the country could become engulfed in civil war and Libya's oil wealth "will be burned."
Gaddafi's regime also appeared to suffer its first defection Sunday when the country's representative to the Arab League said he had resigned his position, angry about the government's harsh tactics in Benghazi.
"Things are getting progressively worse in western Libya," said one Tripoli resident who spoke via messaging on Skype. "Internet is extremely slow and Web browsing is turned off most of the time. We can't make international calls anymore." The resident added that text messaging "doesn't seem to work either."
Renewed calls for talks
In Iran, security forces on Sunday violently put down attempted pro-democracy demonstrations in Tehran and other cities. But elsewhere in the Middle East, besieged autocrats tried to offer olive branches after violent tactics failed to suppress the anger on their streets and the demands for them to resign.
In Yemen, President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who has ruled this impoverished country for 32 years, renewed his call for political dialogue with the nation's main opposition parties, an approach that could lead to a power-sharing deal. The move followed the deaths of at least five protesters and dozens of injuries in nine straight days of demonstrations, which included clashes between security forces and protesters in the capital and in the southern cities of Taiz and Aden.
"We are ready to respond to their demands if they are legitimate," Saleh told several thousand supporters Sunday in the capital, Sanaa. "Dialogue is the best way. Not sabotage. Not blocking the roads."
Saleh is facing growing pressure from outside and within his fold. At least two lawmakers from his ruling party have resigned in recent days over the violent attempts by security forces and pro-Saleh mobs to put down the protests. On Sunday, thousands demonstrated and held sit-ins in Taiz, Ibb, Aden and Sanaa to demand that Saleh step down, according to local reports and witnesses.
Yemen's main coalition of six opposition parties rejected his call for dialogue, declaring there would be no talks as long as Saleh's loyalists and security forces assault protesters. "There is no dialogue with bullets, batons and acts of thugs," the groups said in an e-mailed statement.
In Bahrain, Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad al-Khalifa continued to urge a national dialogue with opposition parties and a period of national mourning to reconcile the nation's majority Shiites and their Sunni rulers.
His calls came after Bahrain's security forces violently cracked down on mostly Shiite protesters, leaving six dead after days of unrest. Security forces withdrew Saturday from Manama's Pearl Square, the epicenter of the demonstrations, and protesters retook the area, demanding sweeping political reforms.
The emboldened opposition is now demanding a constitutional monarchy with a directly elected government, potentially weakening the rule of Bahrain's royal family.
Protests in Morocco
As leaders struggled to find a solution to the unrest, thousands took to the streets in cities across Morocco, the first anti-government demonstrations the country has seen since the wave of populist rebellions began. In Casablanca, nearly 2,000 protesters chanted "Freedom, dignity and justice." Many said they were seeking greater economic opportunities, better public services, more freedoms and an end to corruption. While some want constitutional reforms, others called for a new government.
"We have no equality, no liberty and no democracy. We want regime change," said Yahia, a 25-year-old graduate student who would not give his last name.
In Tunisia, thousands of protesters in the capital defied a ban on rallies, demanding a new interim government and calling for allies of former president Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali to step down. It was one of the largest protests since a populist uprising toppled Ben Ali last month.
Meanwhile, Egyptians on Sunday saw some signs that normalcy is returning after weeks of strife that culminated in President Hosni Mubarak stepping down Feb. 11. Banks opened Sunday, the start of the business week, for the first time in more than a week. Several museums and other tourist sites also reopened.
Human rights concerns
As violence in Libya escalates, there is growing concern that the death toll could rise significantly. On Sunday, there were unconfirmed reports that the unrest has spread to other cities.
At least 10,000 took to the streets in Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city, according to Human Rights Watch, which spoke with medical officials and protesters. Nestled in the eastern part of the country, Benghazi has long been a center of opposition to Gaddafi's regime. In 1996, security forces shot more than 1,000 inmates at Abu Slim prison, a massacre that still fuels bitter resentment.
Human rights activists say another massacre could be underway.
"A potential human rights catastrophe is unfolding in Libya as protesters brave live gunfire and death for a third day running," Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director for Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. "Libya is trying to impose an information blackout, but it can't hide a massacre."
In Tripoli, demonstrations met with shootings and skirmishes and were put down quickly, said the resident who spoke via Skype, who did not want to be identified because of the security risk. He said the uprisings appeared to be spontaneous, with little leadership or organization.
"Everyone is out to topple the regime altogether," he said. "It is a people's revolt. Everyone is acting instinctively."
Correspondents Janine Zacharia in Manama and Leila Fadel and Ernesto Londono in Cairo, special correspondent Gul Tuysuz in Casabalanca, and staff writer Mary Beth Sheridan in Washington contributed to this report.
Source: The Washington Post
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