Gadhafi: U.S. faces bloody war if it enters Libya
Muammar Gadhafi said on Wednesday that Libyans would die in thousands if the United States or other foreign powers enter Libya, and he was ready to discuss constitutional and legal changes without violence.
"Do they want us to become slaves once again like we were slaves to the Italians?" the Libyan leader said, referring to Libya's former colonial power. "We will never accept it. We will enter a bloody war and thousands and thousands of Libyans will die if the United States enters or NATO enters."
Gadhafi, who has lost swaths of his country to rebels, maintained in his speech that he would not resign.
"Muammar Gadhafi is not a president to resign, he does not even have a parliament to dissolve," he said, adding that he held "no position from which to step down."
Meanwhile, fighting between anti-government rebels and forces loyal to the Libyan leader have continued for weeks, with witnesses saying that everything from live ammunition to aerial bombing have been used to suppress the uprising.
On Wednesday, forces loyal to Gadhafi launched a major fightback in Libya's east on Wednesday, sparking a rebel warning that foreign military help might be needed to "put the nail in his coffin" and end his long rule.
Government troops briefly captured Marsa El Brega, an oil export terminal, before being driven back by rebels who have controlled the town 800 km east of the capital Tripoli for about a week, rebel officers said.
At one point in the flip-flopping battle, anti-Gadhafi fighters cornered the attackers in a nearby seaside university campus in fierce fighting that killed at least five.
The assault appeared to be the most significant military operation by Gadhafi since the uprising began two weeks ago and set off a confrontation that Washington says could descend into a long civil war unless the veteran strongman steps down.
Yet in Gadhafi's speech on Wednesday, the leader dismissed accounts of protests in Libya, blaming the unrest instead on al-Qaida. He also suggested that reports of deaths in the unrest were exaggerated, suggesting only 150 people had died.
Foreign estimates suggest 2,000 may have died.
"There were no protests at all in the east," he said in a speech.
"Al Qaeda's cells attacked security forces and took over their weapons," he said, adding: "How did that all begin? Small, sleeper al Qaeda cells."
Gadhafi said that Libya would open its doors to an international investigation and said the United Nations had taken decisions based on false reports.
