Gaddafi’s last 21 days

Former Libyan strongman, Muammar Gaddafi

By Zheng Kaijun and Zhu Xiaolong
Sirte. Former Libyan strongman, Muammar Gaddafi, was a terrified fugitive who spent his last days in humbleness. Emerging details show how Gaddafi –whose flamboyant lifestyle marked him out among his peers, was forced to live without usual comfort, sleeping and eating on the floor.Days before he was flushed out of a roadside tunnel and dragged to his death, witnesses said the former ruler was gripped with fear.The fear and humbleness were things he had not experienced for over four decades that he ruled Libya.

"This is where Muammar Gaddafi was hiding for the last three weeks of his life," a local resident, who identified himself as Munsif, said when he led a group of Xinhua reporters to a double-floor house in the coastal town of Sirte, Gaddafi's hometown.

The house, numbered 24 in the Salahdin Street in northern Sirte, is located in a neighborhood of relatively wealthy people in the city. But months of battles have left the city, where Gaddafi was born in 1942, completely in ruins, with all types of shell cases visible on the city roads and literally every single building damaged.

Not long after Gaddafi took power and became Libya's top figure in 1969, he implemented extensive programmes to expand his hometown village into a city, which he later even wished to become the centre for a "United States of Africa." But during his last days, it became a place for himself.

The Libyan ex-leader, rather than running into the southern desert or seeking refuge in neighbouring countries, as many had predicted, opted to stay in his birthplace until his "mysterious" death after he was captured alive by fighters of the now ruling National Transitional Council (NTC) on October 20.

"Gaddafi was moving with his close guards from place to place within this district, but this was where he spent his last three weeks," Munsif said, opening the gate of the house and then the door to the living room, where about twenty dirty mattresses and empty bottles of water were scattered around.

Despite Gaddafi's conventional defiance towards the end of his life, as suggested by his voice recordings broadcasted by a Syria-based channel, he was certainly living in humbleness and fear that he had not experienced for over four decades.
Several windows of the room were warded off by metal sheets, in a bid to avoid pryers and bullets.

Munsif told Xinhua that Gaddafi would not go outside the murky room while only his chef would make meals for him in a makeshift kitchen in the yard, which was covered by a steel ceiling.

In the last several weeks, about 200 snipers were stationing on rooftops of buildings around Gaddafi's shelter. On occasions, they could resist the heavy offensives from the NTC fighters, and that could prolong Gaddafi's life for another day, Munsif and his friends, who lived around, said.

However, as the NTC and NATO started to narrow down the scope of attacks last week, Gaddafi was compelled to flee. Some one kilometer from his shelter, a fleet of cars are scattered in ashes following the alleged NATO bombardments on Oct. 20, as well as some dozens of dead bodies which are already decomposing and attracting swarms of flies. "They are all the African mercenaries of Gaddafi," said a man in mask, medical gloves and anti-virus coat, who was collecting the corpse onto a truck. "They were killed last Thursday by bombs, before Gaddafi was killed," said the man who requested for anonymity.

According to earlier reports, Gaddafi's car managed to escape the shells, and he later hid into a twin-hole drainage tunnel about only 100 meters away. The holes, less than one meter in diameter, could not afford a standing man, while even sitting inside would be an uncomfortable posture. Considering that the tunnels -- about less than 15 meters long - - are open at both ends, it was almost impossible for Gaddafi to escape.
(Xinhua)