South African President Jacob Zuma met Libyan leader Moammer Qadhafi for truce talks on Monday as Nato said the strongman's "reign of terror" was nearing its end and top military officers deserted him. State news agency JANA said Zuma left the capital after a visit lasting several hours during which he met Qadhafi.
State television broadcast footage of Qadhafi welcoming Zuma at the entrance to a building, in the embattled Libyan leader's first reported public appearance in weeks. JANA said that during Zuma's talks, Tripoli denounced Nato "violations" of UN resolutions, attempts at "political assassination" and destruction of the country's infrastructure and the maritime blockade of Libya.
Zuma arrived at Qadhafi's Bab al-Aziziya compound, a regular target of Nato air strikes, at 1400 GMT. During the talks, the Tripoli regime also demanded a meeting of the UN Security Council to review "mechanisms for applying resolutions on Libya," JANA said.
Before his Tripoli talks, Zuma told South African television news that the Nato campaign was thwarting African Union attempts to broker a peace deal. "Even going there had to be delayed because of bombing," he said in apparent reference to an initial AU mission to Libya. "We only went there long after the time that we had taken a decision, and even going there, you have to ask permission from the Nato to get to Libya."
In Rome, meanwhile, five generals, two colonels and a major announced they had defected from Qadhafi's forces - and also said the regime's army was now at 20-percent capacity. Abdel Rahman Shalgham, a former foreign minister who was Tripoli's UN representative before switching sides, told a press conference: "These officers are among 120 who left Qadhafi and Libya over the last few days."
"We hope more will join us and the Libyan people, and leave the side of this despot and criminal," he said. Zuma arrived in Tripoli shortly after state media said Nato-led air strikes on the town of Zliten, west of the rebel-held city of Misrata, had killed 11 people.