Libya:  Tripoli celebrates capture of Gaddafi's son

Muammar Gaddafi's captured son, Mo'tassim

Libya:  Tripoli celebrates capture of Gaddafi's son

Tripoli on Thursday witnessed celebration as words spread that Libyan government fighters had captured Muammar Gaddafi's son, Mo'tassim in Sirte.

The celebration was greeted by gunfire and fireworks.

The arrest

The National Transitional Council (NTC) officials told reporters that Mo'tassim was captured on Wednesday after he tried to escape from the city in a car with a family member.

"He was arrested today in Sirte", head of the Tripoli Revolutionary Council, Colonel Abdullah Naker, told reporters.

Other NTC sources said Mo'tassim was taken to Benghazi where he was held and questioned at the Boatneh military camp. He was uninjured but exhausted.

As news of the capture spread, hundreds of people gathered in the capital's old city, singing, waving Libya's new flag and shouting "God is greatest".

Hundreds of NTC fighters took to the streets in other cities and fired into the air after Arab television channels broadcast news of the arrest.

"Now we have one Gaddafi. Soon we will have the old man Gaddafi and all the Gaddafis", shouted Mohammed, a 23-year-old engineer.

On the run

A senior NTC military official told reporters that Mo'tassim had cut his usually long hair to disguise himself.

Gaddafi and his most prominent son, Saif Al-Islam, have been on the run since the fall of Tripoli. Gaddafi is believed to be hiding somewhere far to the south in the vast Libyan desert.

His daughter Aisha, her brothers Hannibal and Mohammed, their mother Safi and several other family members fled to Algeria in August. Another son, Saadi, is in Niger.

Rebuilding Libya

NTC fighters said they have made significant advances in Sirte in recent days. On Wednesday, they said they were fighting pro-Gaddafi fighters in two small areas.

"More than 80 percent of Sirte is now under our control. Gaddafi's men are still in parts of the Number Two and the 'Dollar' neighbourhoods", said NTC commander Mustah Hamza.

NTC chairman, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, said on a visit to Sirte on Tuesday that it would take two more days to take the town.

The NTC said it would start the process of rebuilding Libya as a democracy only after the capture of Sirte, a former fishing village believed to have been transformed by Gaddafi into a showpiece for his rule.

The capture of the deposed leader's national security adviser, and the first member of the Gaddafi family, is a big boost to Libya's new rulers whose forces are still battling pro-Gaddafi fighters in his home town of Sirte.

Gaddafi’s loyalists

The banner of Gaddafi's 42 years in power and green flags still flew above many buildings in the neighbourhood, but all appeared quiet.

Gaddafi loyalists were said to have fought for weeks in Sirte, one of the two major towns where they still have footholds, two months after rebels seized Tripoli.

Surrounded on three sides in Sirte and with their backs to the sea, they have fought tenaciously, perhaps believing they face mistreatment or worse.

REUTERS/Shakira/Williams