Gaddafi: My People Love Me, They Would Die for Me

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, who ruled the country for over 40 years, has refused to acknowledge that any protests have taken place in Tripoli. Photo by EPA/BGNES

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi denied there have been any protests in Tripoli and expressed confidence that he is loved by all his people.

"My people love me. They would die for me," Gaddafi said Monday in an interview for the BBC, ABC News and the Sunday Times of London.

The Libyan leader refused to acknowledge there have been any demonstrations in Tripoli and he denied ever using force against his people. He also blamed al-Qaeda for supplying drugs to young people and encouraging them to seize arms from military installations.

Gaddafi laughed at suggestions that he would leave Libya and said he cannot step down because he is not a president or king.

He said he felt betrayed by the United States and world leaders who urge him to leave.

"I'm surprised that we have an alliance with the west to fight al-Qaeda, and now that we are fighting terrorists they have abandoned us. Perhaps they want to occupy Libya," Gaddafi said.

However, he expressed his positive attitude to the US President Barack Obama and called him a "good man", who might have been given "misinformation".

"The statements I have heard from him must have come from someone else. America is not the international police of the world," Gaddafi said.

Obama has called on the Libyan leader to step down and has added that the Libyan government must be held accountable for its brutal crackdown on demonstrators.  

Meanwhile, unrest continued Monday in Tripoli, with reports of an anti-Gaddafi protest in a suburb of the capital, as well as fighting in nearby Misrata and an attack by air force jets on ammunition dumps in the east of the country.

We need your support so Novinite.com can keep delivering news and information about Bulgaria! Thank you!