Browse content similar to 24/08/2011. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!
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Tonight at Ten: Libyans are offered �1million reward to help find | :00:10. | :00:15. | |
Colonel Gaddafi. As the fighting flares again, around Colonel | :00:15. | :00:19. | |
Gaddafi's compound, we report on the rebels' struggle for control. | :00:19. | :00:23. | |
The rebels were driven back out of the centre of the compound this | :00:23. | :00:26. | |
morning, back to the outer wall. They've just stormed back in. | :00:26. | :00:33. | |
They're now firing rockets. Another defiant message from the leader but | :00:33. | :00:38. | |
his whereabouts are still a mystery. And there's joy for dozens of | :00:38. | :00:42. | |
foreign journalists now free after days of captivity in Tripoli. We | :00:42. | :00:46. | |
will have the latest from our team in Tripoli and in the rebel | :00:46. | :00:51. | |
stronghold of Benghazi. Also tonight: This 16-year-old is the | :00:51. | :00:54. | |
first minor whose identity is revealed by the courts after the | :00:54. | :00:58. | |
rioting. A policeman used excessive force | :00:58. | :01:01. | |
when he dragged a disabled man during the student protests in | :01:01. | :01:07. | |
London. And was this the save that kept | :01:07. | :01:13. | |
Arsenal in the Champions League tonight? | :01:13. | :01:18. | |
Nasri has completed his move from Arsenal and in Sportsday we will | :01:18. | :01:21. | |
hear from Manchester City's new signing who has fired a parting | :01:21. | :01:31. | |
:01:31. | :01:46. | ||
Good evening. The hunt is on for Colonel Gaddafi, boosted by a | :01:46. | :01:51. | |
reward of �1 million, and an amnesty to any member of his inner | :01:51. | :01:54. | |
circle who captures or kills him. The Libyan foreign Minister | :01:54. | :01:59. | |
declared today that despite the continued fighting in some parts, | :01:59. | :02:03. | |
Gaddafi's rule was, he said, clearly over. There were more | :02:03. | :02:08. | |
running battles today in central Tripoli, mainly focused on | :02:08. | :02:11. | |
Gaddafi's former compound. For the latest we can join our world | :02:11. | :02:16. | |
affairs editor John Simpson in the Libyan capital tonight. | :02:16. | :02:23. | |
Well, the uprising against Muammar Gaddafi began on 17th February and | :02:23. | :02:30. | |
six difficult painful months later it ended here today as far as the | :02:30. | :02:34. | |
rebels were concerned, with their victory here on the 24th August, | :02:34. | :02:42. | |
which they're now regarding as their victory day. | :02:42. | :02:48. | |
The heart of Tripoli, Green Square, which has been given its old pre- | :02:48. | :02:52. | |
Gaddafi name back. The crowds are celebrating the victory of the | :02:52. | :02:58. | |
revolution. It's not been quick or easy, it's taken six months and one | :02:58. | :03:02. | |
week. It's not even complete, Colonel Gaddafi may have been | :03:02. | :03:07. | |
overthrown, but he is still not been caught. Still none of that | :03:07. | :03:16. | |
affected the atmosphere of pure delight. | :03:16. | :03:20. | |
It's wasteful, it's dangerous, but it's the one way these people know | :03:20. | :03:27. | |
of expressing their feelings after 41 years of repression, they know | :03:27. | :03:33. | |
they're free. It was relief as much as anger. | :03:33. | :03:38. | |
Until just the other day anyone caught doing this to the brother | :03:38. | :03:42. | |
leader's picture could expect a death sentence. I will do all I can | :03:42. | :03:49. | |
to find him, to to catch him, to judge him, to put him in a cage. | :03:49. | :03:59. | |
:03:59. | :04:00. | ||
Ordinary people are suddenly finding that the old parapherali a | :04:00. | :04:05. | |
of snooping has been swept away. the phone we could mention Gaddafi, | :04:05. | :04:08. | |
I think that was the first time we could talk. Other than that we have | :04:08. | :04:18. | |
:04:18. | :04:18. | ||
been talking before and in signs kind of like and not that directly. | :04:18. | :04:24. | |
But Colonel Gaddafi, overthrown or not, remains a master of PR. A | :04:24. | :04:27. | |
television station, not state TV, popped up out of the blue to | :04:27. | :04:32. | |
broadcast his praises. The Colonel himself had even recorded a message | :04:32. | :04:39. | |
for it. TRANSLATION: I walked through Tripoli, nobody | :04:39. | :04:44. | |
recognised me. I saw youths ready to defend their city. They didn't | :04:44. | :04:48. | |
feel the city is in danger, just a bit of riots that can be brought | :04:48. | :04:53. | |
under control. Well, wherever he walked it can't have been Tripoli | :04:53. | :05:01. | |
today. There was a real wildness in the | :05:01. | :05:07. | |
air here, the thought of the new freedom. There are still pockets of | :05:07. | :05:13. | |
resistance around the city, but they're slowly being dealt with one | :05:13. | :05:17. | |
by one and, of course, it's come at a cost, though the overall casualty | :05:17. | :05:21. | |
figures for six months of fighting here haven't been particularly | :05:21. | :05:26. | |
large. Colonel Gaddafi has had a long time to plan out his escape, | :05:26. | :05:32. | |
and, as with Saddam Hussein in 2003, it may take time to catch him. The | :05:32. | :05:38. | |
revolution won't be complete until that happens. | :05:38. | :05:43. | |
Tripoli only fell after the most intense fighting today. But Rupert | :05:43. | :05:47. | |
Wingfield Hayes has been in The Thick of It all along and he and | :05:47. | :05:52. | |
his team were caught in some very heavy fighting indeed around | :05:52. | :06:00. | |
Gaddafi's area of operations. As we entered Gaddafi's compound | :06:00. | :06:07. | |
it's obvious there is still fighting going on. Yesterday's | :06:07. | :06:16. | |
liberation has not cleared all the die-hard loyalists out. And this is | :06:16. | :06:22. | |
about to get a lot more intense. The rebels were driven back out of | :06:22. | :06:25. | |
the centre of the compound here this morning, back out to the outer | :06:25. | :06:30. | |
wall. They've just stormed back in. They're now firing rockets into the | :06:30. | :06:37. | |
middle of the compound. You can hear one going in now. | :06:37. | :06:47. | |
:06:47. | :06:56. | ||
(Gunfire) Get inside! Stay, stay! | :06:56. | :07:00. | |
Once again the assumption that the fighting is over is premature. | :07:00. | :07:05. | |
Gaddafi's compound is a fortress with blast walls, tunnels and | :07:05. | :07:12. | |
bunkers. This man believes Gaddafi is hiding underground. Do you think | :07:12. | :07:16. | |
he is still somewhere in here? you ask me about what I think, I | :07:17. | :07:26. | |
think Gaddafi is here. There's a lot of tunnels and stuff like it's | :07:26. | :07:32. | |
impossible. He built it for this day, to stay running away from | :07:32. | :07:37. | |
people, you know. But until Gaddafi is found, some here still won't | :07:37. | :07:43. | |
dare to believe his dictatorship is really over. When will you feel | :07:43. | :07:49. | |
free? When I feel free I see the blood of Gaddafi on the ground. | :07:49. | :07:56. | |
Then I am free and I can say I am a man. The young rebels believe they | :07:56. | :08:00. | |
have already won. But Gaddafi's supporters still have the ability | :08:00. | :08:04. | |
to create chaos here and that's why as long as Gaddafi himself is still | :08:04. | :08:13. | |
at large, this revolution will not be complete. | :08:13. | :08:18. | |
Let's go back to John Simpson in Tripoli. As Rupert was saying, as | :08:18. | :08:22. | |
you said, while Gaddafi is still at large the revolution can't be | :08:22. | :08:29. | |
considered complete in any way. any way is probably putting it too | :08:29. | :08:35. | |
far, I think. It is complete. It will be complete that is, it's just | :08:35. | :08:40. | |
that there's that whole business undercutting any future Government | :08:40. | :08:43. | |
of thinking that Gaddafi's somewhere out there. He is a clever | :08:43. | :08:47. | |
man at PR. He is very good at popping up at the key moments. It's | :08:47. | :08:51. | |
not necessarily true what he says, but he is good at making it look as | :08:51. | :08:55. | |
though it's true. The fact is that I think the fighting of the past | :08:55. | :09:02. | |
few days has shown that really his strength, the backbone of his | :09:02. | :09:07. | |
strength has been broken. I think - I was in today in an area which was | :09:07. | :09:12. | |
supposedly kind of a no-go area for us, it wasn't at all unsafe. I | :09:12. | :09:17. | |
think all his supporters had fled, were keeping their heads down. It | :09:17. | :09:22. | |
will be very hard for him to recreate any kind of support for | :09:22. | :09:26. | |
himself on any large-scale. But it will be a nuisance and until he is | :09:27. | :09:31. | |
caught people here will say well, you know, this isn't the final | :09:31. | :09:37. | |
proper victory of ours. I think that's going to be the new | :09:37. | :09:40. | |
Government's greatest problem. But you have to remember what happened | :09:40. | :09:46. | |
to Saddam Hussein in 2003, directly he was captured it was taking like | :09:46. | :09:51. | |
the piece off the board, he ceased to have any value whatsoever and I | :09:51. | :10:01. | |
:10:01. | :10:04. | ||
think the same will be true of Colonel Gaddafi. Thank you. | :10:04. | :10:07. | |
Let's consider the evolving strategy, if you like, of the | :10:07. | :10:11. | |
rebels themselves, the stronghold all along has been Benghazi. Our | :10:12. | :10:15. | |
correspondent is there for us. Just a sense from you really of how | :10:15. | :10:22. | |
they're playing this now, not least on the world stage. Very cautiously | :10:22. | :10:28. | |
actually from here, after the exhill exhilaration of the last few | :10:28. | :10:33. | |
days they've been taking it much slower here, the treugs treugs | :10:33. | :10:37. | |
treugs has decided not to move -- National Transitional Council has | :10:37. | :10:42. | |
decided not to move to Tripoli. They're being more cautious. | :10:42. | :10:47. | |
They're realising there is large parts of the country in control of | :10:47. | :10:50. | |
Gaddafi loyalists and they've also been going out internationally, | :10:50. | :10:55. | |
they've begun to Paris -- they've gone to Paris. They've also been at | :10:55. | :10:59. | |
a major meeting in Qatar. I think principally to raise large sums of | :10:59. | :11:03. | |
money. They need billions of dollars so they can start | :11:03. | :11:07. | |
satisfying the huge expectations that will meet them when they | :11:07. | :11:10. | |
arrive in Tripoli, no doubt in a few days or a few weeks, certainly. | :11:10. | :11:15. | |
One other thing to tell you about from here, a fascinating story of | :11:15. | :11:20. | |
how Tripoli really came under their control at the weekend. Operation | :11:20. | :11:23. | |
Mermaid Dawn apparently the opposition tell us this was in | :11:24. | :11:28. | |
planning for several months in co- ordination with NATO and that on a | :11:28. | :11:31. | |
given signal last weekend they basically activated a number of | :11:31. | :11:35. | |
sleeper cells they had in place in Tripoli, co-ordinated that with the | :11:35. | :11:40. | |
invasions we saw from land and sea and a key defection from Gaddafi's | :11:40. | :11:44. | |
camp as well and that's how they finally took control of Tripoli. We | :11:44. | :11:49. | |
may be sceptical about how well planned that was but certainly | :11:49. | :11:52. | |
something dramatic did happen that was a game-changer and I have seen | :11:52. | :11:56. | |
a big change in the opposition. They're much more organised, more | :11:56. | :12:00. | |
disciplined, beginning to look like a potential new Government of Libya. | :12:00. | :12:05. | |
Thank you. By the way, later in the programme | :12:05. | :12:08. | |
we will be reporting on the foreign journalists including a BBC team | :12:08. | :12:12. | |
freed today after being held in captivity in a hotel in central | :12:12. | :12:16. | |
Tripoli, that's in a short while. There's more on the situation in | :12:16. | :12:26. | |
:12:26. | :12:31. | ||
Libya on our special live page Some of the day's other news now. A | :12:31. | :12:35. | |
16-year-old boy from Droitwich is thought to be the first minor | :12:35. | :12:40. | |
involved in the recent rye riots to have his identity revealed. Johnny | :12:40. | :12:43. | |
Melfah pleaded guilty to encouraging theft and criminal | :12:43. | :12:46. | |
damage at Worcester Youth Court. The decision follows a call by the | :12:46. | :12:49. | |
Home Secretary to name young offenders as our correspondent Matt | :12:50. | :12:54. | |
Prodger reports. Johnny Melfah, just 16, but named | :12:55. | :13:00. | |
and shamed by a court. He pleaded guilty to posting a message on | :13:00. | :13:05. | |
Facebook calling for a riot. After disturbances swept through | :13:05. | :13:11. | |
England a fortnight ago police arrested and charged the teenager. | :13:11. | :13:14. | |
Johnny Melfah's crime of inciting riots on Facebook has made him the | :13:14. | :13:18. | |
first youth under the age of 17 to be publicly identified in | :13:18. | :13:22. | |
connection with the riots. What makes it more unusual is that he | :13:22. | :13:26. | |
was nowhere near riot hot spots like this in Tottenham, he was | :13:26. | :13:30. | |
miles away in Worcester, a place untouched by the violence. There | :13:30. | :13:35. | |
was no word from Johnny Melfah's home today. Some in the teenager's | :13:35. | :13:39. | |
town near Worcester thought the court decision unfair. Others did | :13:39. | :13:44. | |
not. Yeah, I am delighted. Good. Name them and shame them, that's | :13:44. | :13:48. | |
what I say, it will hopefully deter others. Well, I mean, they do | :13:48. | :13:53. | |
deserve some sort of punishment for doing that but it is over the top | :13:53. | :13:59. | |
that. Only an exceptional circumstances like the murder of | :13:59. | :14:03. | |
Jamie Bulger, can child offenders be identified. But the solicitor | :14:03. | :14:13. | |
:14:13. | :14:16. | ||
back then for one of the young A lot of members of the public are | :14:16. | :14:21. | |
feeling the outrage and uproar against those involved and it is | :14:21. | :14:25. | |
therefore now in the public's interest, and that is what the | :14:25. | :14:30. | |
magistrate probably felt, for the defendant to be named. | :14:30. | :14:37. | |
government recently said that child rioters should have been named and | :14:37. | :14:42. | |
shamed but a source close to the coalition has reservations. | :14:42. | :14:47. | |
anonymity is there for a reason and the anonymity should only be raised | :14:47. | :14:50. | |
if there is a proportionate public interest in telling the public who | :14:51. | :14:54. | |
the offender is. It should not be done lightly, it should not be done | :14:55. | :14:58. | |
routinely and it should not be done because of political encouragement | :14:58. | :15:03. | |
by ministers. Several adults have been convicted of using Facebook to | :15:03. | :15:09. | |
incite rioting. Two of them serving four years. Tomorrow the government | :15:09. | :15:13. | |
and police will be asking social media sites what they can do to | :15:13. | :15:20. | |
prevent such criminality from being co-ordinated. Coming up on | :15:20. | :15:23. | |
tonight's programme: Five minutes after lift-off, disaster strikes a | :15:23. | :15:30. | |
rocket bound for the International Space Station. We will have the | :15:30. | :15:34. | |
story. Of Police used excessive force when | :15:34. | :15:37. | |
they dragged a disabled man across a road during student | :15:37. | :15:41. | |
demonstrations in London last year. The Independent Police Complaints | :15:41. | :15:44. | |
Commission said an officer should be given management advice for | :15:44. | :15:48. | |
using too much force. The protestor, Jody McIntyre, had been removed | :15:48. | :15:52. | |
from his wheelchair and struck with a baton. Scotland Yard says it will | :15:52. | :15:59. | |
consider the findings, as Tom Symonds reports. | :15:59. | :16:02. | |
It was one of the many confrontations between protesters | :16:02. | :16:08. | |
and police that December night. But the way in which Jody MacIntyre was | :16:08. | :16:13. | |
removed from his wheelchair and dragged from the road has resulted | :16:13. | :16:17. | |
in two investigations. Today, the Independent Police Complaints | :16:17. | :16:20. | |
Commission decided it was appropriate to move came, as police | :16:20. | :16:26. | |
attempted to control the streets, but that they used excessive force. | :16:26. | :16:30. | |
The police watchdog has also concluded that the incident, right | :16:30. | :16:35. | |
in the heart of Westminster, may have amounted to assault and should | :16:35. | :16:39. | |
have been reported to prosecutors. Six months on, the time limit for | :16:39. | :16:46. | |
that has now passed. Why is it that when young people are writing in | :16:46. | :16:53. | |
London, they have the courts open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, | :16:53. | :17:01. | |
but when a police officer commits a crime, they over run a six-month | :17:01. | :17:07. | |
limit to prosecute that police officer. Mr MacIntyre is a | :17:07. | :17:12. | |
prominent activist. He was at the forefront of the student protests. | :17:13. | :17:15. | |
The Met's investigation concluded he was inadvertently struck by a | :17:16. | :17:22. | |
police baton in his early incident. No officer was blamed but the IPCC | :17:22. | :17:26. | |
report says the force should have apologised and the officers should | :17:26. | :17:30. | |
have been given so-called words of advice. Jody McIntyre has been | :17:30. | :17:33. | |
criticised for suggesting on Twitter that neighbourhoods should | :17:33. | :17:37. | |
be inspired by the recent riots and rise up against the police. He has | :17:37. | :17:42. | |
argued, following his experiences in December, that public order | :17:42. | :17:46. | |
policing is too heavy handed. But in recent weeks, the criticism has | :17:46. | :17:52. | |
been the opposite. That the police should have been tougher. | :17:52. | :17:54. | |
Merseyside Police have been criticised by the Independent | :17:54. | :17:57. | |
Police Complaints Commission for failing to monitor a sex offender | :17:57. | :18:01. | |
who went on to murder a teenage girl. Peter Chapman, a convicted | :18:01. | :18:04. | |
rapist, killed 17-year-old Ashleigh Hall after befriending her on | :18:04. | :18:09. | |
Facebook. The IPCC said he had been allowed to slip away from attention | :18:09. | :18:12. | |
and explained one police constable had the job of monitoring 60 sex | :18:12. | :18:19. | |
offenders. The man who murdered the headmaster | :18:19. | :18:22. | |
Philip Lawrence outside his school in 1995 has been cleared of robbing | :18:22. | :18:26. | |
a someone at a cash machine in north London. Learco Chindamo, | :18:26. | :18:29. | |
who's now 31, had been accused of using his notoriety as a killer to | :18:29. | :18:37. | |
intimidate and rob. Russian officials say an unmanned | :18:37. | :18:39. | |
spaceship bound for the International Space Station has | :18:39. | :18:46. | |
exploded and fallen to earth five minutes after lift-off. It was | :18:46. | :18:49. | |
carrying more than two tons of supplies for the space station and | :18:49. | :18:53. | |
its six astronauts. The Russian spaceships are now the only supply | :18:53. | :18:56. | |
link since the ending of the US shuttle program. Our science | :18:56. | :19:03. | |
correspondent, Pallab Ghosh, has the story. | :19:03. | :19:08. | |
The Progress spacecraft lifted of smoothly enough from the cosmodrome | :19:08. | :19:12. | |
in Kazakhstan this afternoon, but as a rocket disappeared from view, | :19:12. | :19:17. | |
the proportion system stalled and fell back to earth. The cargo ship | :19:17. | :19:20. | |
was carrying several tons of supplies to the International Space | :19:21. | :19:24. | |
Station but there won't be any immediate problem for the | :19:24. | :19:29. | |
astronauts on board, according to NASA. We are in a good position | :19:29. | :19:34. | |
logistically to withstand this also supplies and in fact, I will tell | :19:34. | :19:38. | |
you we can go several months without a resupply vehicle if that | :19:38. | :19:48. | |
becomes necessary. The unmanned rocket used to supply the station | :19:48. | :19:52. | |
issued -- space station is similar to the one here, so until it | :19:52. | :19:55. | |
investigators find out what went wrong, there will be no more | :19:55. | :19:59. | |
launches but the crew will not be trapped. They can get back to earth | :19:59. | :20:04. | |
in capsules that are already docked. The scrapping know of the shuttle | :20:04. | :20:10. | |
programme in July means that there is now no back-up plan. It draws | :20:10. | :20:14. | |
attention to how vulnerable the International Space Station project | :20:14. | :20:17. | |
is without the shuttle, because should anything more serious go | :20:17. | :20:21. | |
wrong, you need the vehicle as large as the space shuttle to do a | :20:21. | :20:26. | |
space walk from to repair the space station so you can colonise it | :20:26. | :20:29. | |
again and without that kind of capability, which we do not have | :20:29. | :20:36. | |
now, you might end up losing the space station altogether. Hurricane | :20:36. | :20:41. | |
Irene monitor this evening from the crew of the space station. If after | :20:41. | :20:46. | |
several months the problem with the Russian rocket system has not been | :20:46. | :20:52. | |
solved, the orbiting laboratory will have to be abandoned. | :20:52. | :20:55. | |
Money held by British people in Swiss bank accounts is to be taxed | :20:55. | :21:01. | |
for the first time. The deal could see between 3 and �6 billion a year | :21:01. | :21:05. | |
being handed by the Swiss authorities to Revenue and Customs. | :21:05. | :21:08. | |
It's being described as a landmark agreement and follows a similar | :21:08. | :21:11. | |
deal between Germany and the Swiss authorities. Our chief economics | :21:11. | :21:17. | |
correspondent is at the Treasury tonight. What do you make of the | :21:17. | :21:21. | |
deal? With it healed the kind of money they are talking about? -- | :21:21. | :21:25. | |
which Heald? The Treasury Minister, David Gauke, | :21:25. | :21:29. | |
has been telling me this evening that the days where British | :21:29. | :21:32. | |
residence could evade tax and the proceeds in Swiss bank accounts | :21:32. | :21:37. | |
will soon be over. Tax experts say this is a big step forward and | :21:37. | :21:43. | |
could give the Treasury up to �5 billion. Holders of these accounts | :21:43. | :21:46. | |
can either come to the UK tax authority voluntarily and come to | :21:46. | :21:50. | |
an arrangement but if they don't, by 2013, the Swiss authorities were | :21:51. | :21:55. | |
removed up to 34% from each account and handed over to the Treasury and | :21:55. | :22:00. | |
after that will deduct something from annual income, up to 48%. That | :22:00. | :22:04. | |
is more an onerous than some of the regimes like Guernsey and Jersey. | :22:04. | :22:08. | |
Some will say these investors will keep their anonymity if they hold | :22:08. | :22:12. | |
onto this was badly counts and they will be paying a bit less tax there | :22:12. | :22:17. | |
than that they would do if they had the money here, but there has been | :22:17. | :22:20. | |
hard-headed negotiations between the HMRC and this was authorities | :22:20. | :22:24. | |
and the view is it is better to get the money in, particularly when you | :22:24. | :22:29. | |
are trying to reduce the deficit. Tottenham Hotspur have won the | :22:29. | :22:32. | |
right to challenge a decision on the future of the Olympic Stadium | :22:32. | :22:36. | |
in east London after next summer's games. Previously, West Ham United | :22:36. | :22:40. | |
had been told it could move into the stadium. But Tottenham say the | :22:40. | :22:44. | |
decision was unfair. A hearing at the High Court is due to start in | :22:44. | :22:48. | |
October. Arsenal were in action tonight, | :22:48. | :22:52. | |
with millions of pounds riding on the outcome of their game in Italy. | :22:52. | :22:54. | |
The North London side were playing Udinese in the Champions' League | :22:54. | :23:04. | |
:23:04. | :23:07. | ||
qualifiers. Andy Swiss watched the For Arsenal, the stakes had rarely | :23:07. | :23:11. | |
been higher. �20 million, the price of the Champions' League spot. For | :23:11. | :23:17. | |
so many years, a given for them. But not now. And with a dodgy form | :23:17. | :23:21. | |
and depleted squad, they were soon wobbling. Twice the Italians hit | :23:21. | :23:27. | |
the post, although Arsenal also threatened. Theo Walcott and Robin | :23:27. | :23:32. | |
van Persie brilliantly denied. But Udinese was stronger and soon be | :23:32. | :23:39. | |
struck. Di Natale the scorer, but tension unbearable. But after the | :23:39. | :23:44. | |
break, the sigh of relief. Van Persie giving the Gunners are a | :23:44. | :23:50. | |
crucial away goal. Game over? Not quite. Handball and penalty to be | :23:50. | :23:57. | |
Udinese. But watch this! Szczesny with the save of his life. And when | :23:57. | :24:02. | |
Walcott men did pace and poise, Arsenal's duties were finally over. | :24:03. | :24:06. | |
They might still have their problems but at least they have the | :24:06. | :24:15. | |
Amid the turmoil in Tripoli today, there was relief and joy for a | :24:15. | :24:19. | |
group of foreign journalists who had been held by Gaddafi's are | :24:19. | :24:24. | |
supporters at a hotel in the city centre. They spent six days trapped | :24:24. | :24:27. | |
inside the Rixos Hotel, with dwindling supplies of food and | :24:27. | :24:32. | |
water. A BBC team, including Matthew Price among them. He sent | :24:32. | :24:38. | |
this report. This was all we saw of the battle | :24:38. | :24:46. | |
for Tripoli. But it came close. Into the dining Room of the hotel, | :24:46. | :24:51. | |
long-abandoned, we stayed away from the windows of four long days. We | :24:51. | :24:56. | |
scavenged what food we could from the hotel stores. Sleeping and | :24:56. | :25:00. | |
living for much of the day in our body armour. Nervous of the pro- | :25:00. | :25:06. | |
Gadaffi guards roaming down below. Something seems to be happening | :25:06. | :25:11. | |
downstairs but we are not sure what it is. So we are just getting ready. | :25:11. | :25:17. | |
We prepared, fearing Gaddafi forces might come into the hotels. Perhaps | :25:17. | :25:26. | |
even to use us as human shields. TV comedy TV... Nothing else. | :25:26. | :25:32. | |
this morning, we scattered around the hotel. Many of Gaddafi's guards | :25:32. | :25:37. | |
had vanished. Colonel Gaddafi still seemed to rule in this tiny patch | :25:37. | :25:41. | |
of Tripoli. The guards truly believed his forces could take back | :25:41. | :25:48. | |
the city. So began the negotiations. CNN's Jordanian producer was | :25:48. | :25:53. | |
pivotal. The guard was confused. After four decades of Gaddafi rule, | :25:53. | :25:58. | |
he refused to believe it was all over. So we ventured out. Not all | :25:58. | :26:05. | |
of them had gone. GUNFIRE. Then finally, after five days of not | :26:05. | :26:11. | |
knowing whether we would get out, we did. Into our armoured vehicle, | :26:11. | :26:17. | |
as the Red Cross swept in to carry the others out. Out through a city | :26:17. | :26:21. |