Kadhafi, sons must leave Libya: rebels in Doha

DOHA: Libyan rebels attending an international contact group meeting in Doha will accept nothing short of Colonel Moamer Kadhafi's departure from Libya, a spokesman said on Tuesday.

"We shall not accept or listen to any proposal for a political solution if it does not stipulate in its first clause the departure of Kadhafi and his sons from Libya," Mahmud Shammam said on the eve of the meeting.

Shammam confirmed to AFP that the rebels' Transitional National Council (TNC) would attend the first meeting of the contact group of high-level international diplomats that was set up at a conference in London last month.

"We want to move from the de facto recognition of the council to an internationally-recognised legitimacy," said Shammam, who holds the media portfolio in the TNC.

French foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero played up the TNC involvement in the one-day meeting being hosted by Qatar, the co-chair along with Britain.

"Not only will they be there, but -- and this should be checked with the Qataris -- unlike London, where they were on the sidelines, they will appear before the contact group," said a French foreign ministry spokesman.

On March 29 in London, the TNC was kept out of a plenary session of the international ministerial conference on the crisis in Libya, although its envoys held two-way talks in the British capital with several world powers. (AFP)