White House, in Shift, Turns Against Syria Leader

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration, after weeks of urging Syria to carry out democratic reforms and end a brutal crackdown, has now turned decisively against President Bashar al-Assad, saying that he has lost legitimacy and that it has no interest in Mr. Assad keeping his grip on power.

President Obama, in an interview Tuesday with the “CBS Evening News,” stopped short of demanding that Mr. Assad step down. But administration officials said the president may take that step in coming days, as he did with Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, much earlier in that country’s popular uprising.
Mr. Obama’s comments, and even stronger ones by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday, showed that the administration has now concluded that Mr. Assad is no more willing or capable than Colonel Qaddafi of opening a dialogue with protesters or overseeing a political transformation.
The turning point in the administration’s public posture came after angry crowds attacked and vandalized the United States Embassy in Damascus, and the residence of Ambassador Robert Ford, after his visit to Hama, the hub of the current protests and site of a bloody crackdown by Mr. Assad’s father in 1982.
But administration officials said the shift has been weeks in the making, as Mr. Assad’s government has continued to harass and jail demonstrators, quash peaceful protests, and clamp down attempts to organize a political opposition. The crackdown has also begun to threaten regional stability with thousands of Syrian refugees fleeing across the northern border into Turkey.
“You’re seeing President Assad lose legitimacy in the eyes of his people,” Mr. Obama said to the CBS anchor, Scott Pelley. “He has missed opportunity after opportunity to present a genuine reform agenda. And that’s why we’ve been working at an international level to make sure we keep the pressure up.”
On Monday, Mrs. Clinton said, “If anyone, including President Assad, thinks the United States is secretly hoping that the regime will emerge from the turmoil to continue its brutality and repression, they are wrong. President Assad is not indispensable, and we have absolutely nothing invested in him remaining in power.”
Mrs. Clinton’s comments seemed calculated to answer critics who pointed to the striking difference in how the administration responded to Libya and Syria — and contended that it has acted too gingerly toward Mr. Assad, fearing that his downfall would destabilize other countries in its neighborhood.
Administration officials said they had no choice in Libya: Colonel Qaddafi is notoriously unpredictable, and had threatened to send his troops house-to-house in Benghazi, killing his opponents. In Syria’s case, there is no military remedy. NATO nations have no interest in acting in Syria, and there is no chance of a United Nations Security Council resolution equivalent to the one that NATO is enforcing in Libya. Russia has made clear it would reject any resolution condemning Mr. Assad.
Unlike Libya, Syria is a force in the region, one that the administration once thought could be drawn away from Iran’s orbit and play a part in an Israeli-Palestinian peace accord. Some critics, however, have always contended that it was naïve to assume that the Assad government could be a force for peace.
Still, until recently some American officials argued they were better off with Mr. Assad in power than with a power vacuum that could threaten the stability of Lebanon and security of Israel, and might be filled by Iran. But now that Mr. Assad “has shown definitively he has no interest in reform,” one senior official said, “the rationale for holding on to him has evaporated.”
The United States, officials said, is readying fresh sanctions against senior members of the Assad regime, and is weighing sanctions on Syria’s oil and gas industry. It is also watching a meeting of opposition groups set for this Saturday, which officials said could offer hope that the opposition — disorganized and lacking in leaders after decades of repression — is developing a viable transition plan.
Mr. Assad, officials cautioned, was far from being toppled. On any given day, they said, his government or the opposition holds the upper hand. But the upheaval has badly damaged Syria’s economy. For the first time, a senior official said, “the government has admitted that this is a crisis.”
“What led Washington, as well as the Turks and the Europeans to change their minds, was Assad’s complete lack of reliability,” said Andrew Tabler, an expert on Syria at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “He promised not to use live fire against protesters, and the next day, he used live fire.”
While Mr. Tabler said the Assad regime was “degrading and disintegrating,” he added, “most people believe this is going to take a long time.”
Marshaling action against Syria’s oil and gas industry is complicated, Mr. Tabler said, because European and Canadian companies have investments there. The United States also has to worry about Arab neighbors like Saudi Arabia or Kuwait trying to throw Mr. Assad a financial lifeline in the name of regional stability.
The United States has tried to bring other forms of pressure to bear. It leaned on the International Atomic Energy Agency to refer to the United Nations a finding that the Syrian government sought to build a secret nuclear reactor, which was destroyed by Israel in a nighttime raid in September 2007. Mr. Assad has denied the facility had any nuclear use; the atomic energy agency concluded differently. The reactor was built, intelligence officials say, with secret aid from North Korea.
The mob attack on the United States Embassy and residence, as well as a similar assault on the French Embassy, brought a statement of condemnation from the United Nations Security Council. But the unanimity required of the 15 council members has proved harder to muster for any stronger action.
Administration officials said Mr. Ford’s visit to Hama, where he was met by welcoming crowds, showed the value of sending an envoy to Syria — something members of Congress have criticized. While the officials said they could not prove Mr. Ford’s presence there averted a violent assault by security forces, one said: “It’s very possible. A lot of people were expecting Hama to be very ugly.”

New UN force in South Sudan will have 7,000 military and 900 police

UNITED NATIONS — A new U.N. peacekeeping mission for South Sudan will have up to 7,000 military personnel and 900 international police with a mandate to keep peace and help promote development in the world’s newest nation, according to the draft U.N. resolution obtained late Thursday by The Associated Press.

The U.N. Security Council held intensive discussions this week to reach agreement on a resolution that would authorize the new mission and ensure its adoption before South Sudan officially becomes independent from Sudan’s Khartoum-ruled north on Saturday.
The council scheduled a meeting Friday morning, when diplomats said the draft resolution is almost certain to be approved unanimously.
Russian concerns about authorizing a mission before South Sudan becomes independent were overcome by including the phrase: “Welcoming the establishment of the Republic of South Sudan on July 9, 2011 upon its proclamation as an independent state,” the diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity because negotiations were private.
The draft resolution would establish a new United Nations Mission in the Republic of South Sudan on July 9 for an initial period of one year, with up to 7,000 military personnel and 900 civilian police as well as civilian staff including human rights experts. It calls for reviews after three months and six months to determine if conditions on the ground would allow the military contingent to be reduced from 7,000 to 6,000 troops.
It also gives the U.N. mission, to be known as UNMISS, a mandate “to consolidate peace and security, and to help establish the conditions for development ... with a view to strengthening the capacity of the government of the Republic of South Sudan to govern effectively and democratically and establish good relations with its neighbors.”
The draft resolution specifically authorizes the mission to support the new government on its political transition, issues of governance and establishing state authority throughout the country, and to advise it on “an inclusive constitutional process,” holding elections, and establishing an independent media.
It authorizes U.N. peacekeepers to support the government in preventing conflict and demobilizing combatants, to conduct patrols in areas at high risk of conflict, and to protect civilians “under imminent threat of physical violence.” It also authorizes the mission to cooperate with U.N. agencies in supporting the government in peacebuilding activities, including promoting development, the rule of law, security and justice.
Independence for South Sudan is the culmination of a 2005 peace deal that ended more than two decades of civil war between Sudan’s Arab-dominated north and mainly ethnic African south, one of the longest and deadliest conflicts in Africa.
But there are fears that war could be re-ignited in the poverty-stricken nation because troops from the north and south are facing off in the contested oil-rich border region of Abyei and northern troops and forces loyal to the south are fighting in Southern Kordofan, a state just over the border in the north.
The U.N. has had a 10,400-strong peacekeeping force, known as UNMIS, monitoring implementation of the 2005 north-south agreement, which operates on both sides of the border. Its mandate expires Saturday and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon proposed a three-month extension but the Khartoum government rejected any extension and said it wanted all U.N. troops out of the north.
Diplomats said the five permanent Security Council nations — the U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France — jointly asked the Sudanese government earlier this week to allow a U.N. presence in the north after South Sudan breaks away.
U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice, who will be leading the American delegation to South Sudan’s independence ceremonies, said Thursday in Washington that many council members are trying to persuade Sudan’s leaders “that it is not in their interest that the U.N. be compelled to leave abruptly or prematurely” while key issues from the 2005 agreement remain unresolved and “a volatile and grave humanitarian situation” exists in Southern Kordofan and possibly neighboring Blue Nile state.
“We will continue to do what we can to underscore to Khartoum that it is in their interests and the interests of the region that they not take this step,” Rice said. “But they seem thus far to be quite determined, and this poses a great deal of worry for the security of people in Southern Kordofan, for the common border, for humanitarian access and a number of other important issues.”
Haile Menkerios, the top U.N. envoy in Sudan, said Thursday in Juba that the “liquidation” of UNMIS will start on July 10. Diplomats said between 2,500-3,000 U.N. peacekeepers are currently based in Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile where fighting continues.
“U.N. engagement in Sudan will, however, continue,” Menkerios said. “The United Nations will continue its support to the government of Sudan, the government of South Sudan and to the people of Sudan as a whole through its agencies, funds and programs, a new mission in South Sudan and a new mission in Abyei.”
Leaders from the north and south signed an agreement on June 20 to demilitarize Abyei and allow and Ethiopian peacekeeping force to move and a week later the Security Council authorized the deployment of 4,200 Ethiopian troops in Abyei for six months.
One unresolved issue is future responsibility for monitoring the north-south border.
The governments of both Sudans signed an agreement on border security on June 29 and the draft resolution calls on the parties to propose arrangements for border monitoring by July 20. If they fail to do so, the resolution requests the new U.N. mission in South Sudan “to observe and report on any flow of personnel, arms and related materiel across the border with Sudan.”

AP Exclusive: Israeli, Palestinian forces hope to thwart violence in September

Israeli and Palestinian security forces are already taking precautions to avoid an outbreak of violence after an expected U.N. vote for Palestinian independence in September, officials on both sides said Sunday, reflecting shared concerns about the possibility of renewed fighting this fall.

For now, Israeli and Palestinian officials said they do not want — or expect — armed hostilities to resume.
But both sides fear that one small incident could quickly spin out of control.
“We need only popular and peaceful struggle,” said Amin Makboul, a top official in Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah Party. “We want to show the world that we are responsible and deserve to be part of the international community.”
After the bitter lessons of last decade’s Palestinian uprising, the Palestinians do not want to give Israel any “pretext” to claim the Palestinians are not serious about creating a peaceful state, Makboul added.
A top Palestinian security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Abbas recently issued a straightforward order to his commanders: “I don’t want any violent actions in September,” the official quoted Abbas as saying. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was discussing a sensitive internal meeting.
Israeli and Palestinian officials both say the region is headed into uncharted waters if the Palestinians follow through on their pledge to turn to the United Nations.
Each side is trying to prepare for all scenarios. Mostly it is in closed forums whose deliberations are so tightly guarded as to suggest a fear that the mere mention of a new Palestinian uprising might somehow contribute to tensions. However, some preparations are more public.
Some 1,000 Israeli military officers held a two-day drill last week to prepare for September, discussing such issues as crowd-control tactics and the latest intelligence, officials say.
The army will use the coming months to fine-tune its preparations in hopes of avoiding bloodshed, they said.
Abbas has said he will seek an international endorsement of Palestinian independence if peace talks with Israel remain stalled, as they have been for nearly three years. The U.S. has stepped up efforts to find a formula for renewing negotiations in recent weeks, but there have been no signs of a breakthrough.
The Palestinians say they will not resume talks until Israel freezes all contruction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem — areas captured in 1967 which they claim for a future state.
A senior Palestinian official has hinted the Palestinians will ease this demand if Israel accepts President Barack Obama’s formula of basing a future Palestinian state on Israel’s pre-1967 frontiers, with agreed land swaps. Setting the rough outlines of a future border at the outset, the thinking goes, would largely solve the settlement issue on its own — since Israel would know which of the communities it will ultimately be able to keep.
Israel has reacted coolly to Obama’s plan, saying that all issues, including settlements and final borders, should be reached in negotiations.

NATO bombs Tripoli, U.S. says time against Gaddafi

NATO warplanes hammered Tripoli on Tuesday with some of their heaviest air strikes yet after the United States said Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi would "inevitably" be forced from power.

At least 12 huge explosions rocked the capital in the early hours. Government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim said three people were killed and 150 wounded.

He said the strikes had targeted a compound of the Popular Guards, a tribally-based military detachment. But he said the compound had been emptied of people and "useful material" in anticipation of an attack, and the casualties were people living in the vicinity.

"This is another night of bombing and killing by NATO," Ibrahim told reporters.

Led by France, Britain and the United States, NATO warplanes have been bombing Libya for more than two months since the United Nations authorized "all necessary measures" to protect civilians from Gaddafi's forces in the country's civil war.

"We have degraded his war machine and prevented a humanitarian catastrophe. And we will continue to enforce the U.N. resolutions with our allies until they are completely complied with," President Barack Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron wrote in The Times newspaper.

U.N. Security Council 1973, passed on March 17, established a no-fly zone and called for a ceasefire, an end to attacks on civilians, respect for human rights and efforts to meet Libyans' aspirations.

In upbeat comments, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told a news conference in London on Monday: "We do believe that time is working against Gaddafi, that he cannot re-establish control over the country."

She said the opposition had organized a legitimate and credible interim council that was committed to democracy.

"Their military forces are improving and when Gaddafi inevitably leaves, a new Libya stands ready to move forward," she said. "We have a lot of confidence in what our joint efforts are producing."

CONFLICT DEADLOCKED

Rebels trying to overthrow Gaddafi's 41-year rule control the east of the oil-producing country, but the conflict has been deadlocked for weeks.

In an escalation that could help break the stalemate, French officials said on Monday that France and Britain would deploy attack helicopters, a step aimed at targeting Gaddafi's forces more precisely.

"What we want is to better tailor our ability to strike on the ground with ways that allow more accurate hits," French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said.

But the use of helicopters carries risks for NATO, as they would fly lower than warplanes and be more exposed to ground fire. The downing of helicopters could draw ground forces into rescue efforts.

Reporters, whose movements are tightly controlled by the Libyan authorities, were taken to visit Tripoli's central hospital after the heavy night raids.

They were shown the corpses of three men with grave head injuries, their bodies laid out on gurneys.

A man who identified himself only as Hatim, who had deep gashes and abrasions on his arms and legs, said the force of the blasts had caved in part of his residence near the military compound.

"We were in the house and then, wham, the ceiling came down, right on me," he said.

Smaller blasts were heard intermittently for several minutes after the final round of strikes, which shook windows and brought plaster down from ceilings in the Tripoli hotel where foreign reporters are staying.

Sri Lanka war crimes: Main allegations

A thin strip of land in northern Sri Lanka was the brutal theatre of war during the closing phase of Sri Lanka's 26-year civil conflict. Thousands of civilians were hemmed in as the government battled Tamil Tiger rebels fighting for a separate homeland.

The UN report focuses on alleged war crimes committed by both the Sri Lankan armed forces and Tamil Tigers during the months leading up to the defeat of the rebels in May 2009.

Numerous allegations were circulating at the time and have emerged since. During that final stage of combat very few of the accusations could be independently verified. Journalists and most aid groups were barred from the region.

Civilian deaths 

In March 2009, the UN said it feared actions by both sides might amount to war crimes. The UN High Commissioner of Human Rights Navi Pillay described the level of civilian deaths as "truly shocking", and warned it could reach "catastrophic" levels.

The government was accused of repeatedly shelling safe zones set up to protect civilians. The rebels were accused of holding civilians as human shields and firing on those who tried to flee. Both denied the allegations.

At the time, The Times newspaper also claimed that more than 20,000 people had been killed in the closing stages of the conflict.

The UN estimated that up to 7,000 people had died by the end of April. The latest report now says it believes tens of thousands of civilians were killed in that final stage, adding that most civilian casualties in the final phases of the war were caused by government shelling.

Conduct of war

Sri Lanka's government was accused of using heavy weaponry and UN images obtained by the BBC appeared to show shelling damage in a government-designated "safe zone" for civilians.

The UN report claims the government shelled food distribution lines and near ICRC ships coming to pick up wounded civilians from beaches.

The government denied security forces had shelled the safe zone, saying there were a number of rebel suicide blasts in that area. The UN reportals is also said to condemn the rebels for killing civilians through suicide attacks.

Tamil Tiger rebels were primarily criticised for allegedly using civilians as human shields.

Britain and France said the rebels had been "forcefully preventing civilians from leaving" during a 48-hour ceasefire. The rebels said the truce had not been long enough to allow civilians to safely leave the conflict zone. They rejected the charge that rebels prevented civilians from leaving the war zone.

The UN report also alleges the forced recruitment of children by rebels.

Hospital shelled

The report accuses the government of "systematically" shelling hospitals on the front line. In May 2009, sources in one hospital in rebel-held territory claimed that government forces shelled it, killing dozens of people. One doctor described the artillery bombardment to the BBC.

At the time ,the Sri Lankan government denied the army had caused civilian casualties but said it had pierced rebel defences.

After the conflict ended, a group of doctors who worked in Sri Lanka's rebel-held war zone were arrested on suspicion of collaborating with rebels. They later retracted their accusations against the government.

Extra-judicial killings

After the war more allegations emerged. One video obtained by Britain's Channel 4 news purported to show the extra-judicial killing of what were thought to be Tamil rebels. Sri Lanka's army spokesman angrily rejected the video as a fabrication.

In late 2010, graphic video which apparently showed more footage from the same incident was aired by Channel 4 news. The pictures, which also showed bloodstained and blindfolded bodies, was rejected by Sri Lanka as an attempt by rebel sympathisers to tarnish Sri Lanka's image.

And one senior army commander told Channel 4 news that orders for the killings came from the top - Sri Lanka denied those allegations.

The authenticity of the footage and images cannot be verified.

Civilian ordeal

In the midst of the fighting, the BBC talked to civilians fleeing the war about their ordeal. They said they had lived under constant gunfire, intense shelling and an acute shortage of water, food and medicine.

They also confirmed accusations that the rebels were forcibly recruiting children. The head of the charity Medecins Sans Frontieres in Sri Lanka told the BBC of shrapnel wounds to the limbs of civilians.

The BBC was part of a trip organised by the government to part of the recently captured front line, where refugees in a state of shock were listlessly standing. The army said it would work on developing the area.

The BBC has also heard numerous allegations from Tamils that their relatives are missing, among them a number of senior rebel fighters.

The government says that the military inflicted no civilian deaths during the final stages of its victory.

International human rights groups, however, say a comprehensive and independent war crimes inquiry is needed.

Sri Lanka conducted its own inquiry into war crimes but human rights groups refused to participate, saying the inquiry does not meet international standards.

Estimates say that as many as 100,000 people were killed during 26 years of war.

Ouattara Forces Advance in Abidjan; Massacre Leaves 800 Dead

Forces loyal to President-elect Alassane Ouattara advanced in Ivory Coast’s commercial capital, Abidjan, as aid agencies said at least 800 people were killed in a massacre outside the city.

The Republican Forces control more than 90 percent of Abidjan, Meite Sindou, a spokesman for the militia, said yesterday. Gunfire continued in the Plateau district, the site of the presidential palace, Agence France-Presse reported.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said the massacre took place in the western town of Duekoue as Ouattara’s troops moved toward Abidjan to try to oust incumbent leader Laurent Gbagbo. Aid groups didn’t say who was responsible for the deaths in Duekoue.

The United Nations, the U.S., the African Union and the U.K. are calling on Gbagbo, 65, to hand power over to Ouattara, 69, whom they recognize as the winner of the nation’s first election in a decade. Gbagbo refuses to accept defeat in the Nov. 28 vote.

Ouattara’s forces entered Abidjan on March 30, attacking Gbagbo’s palace, army camps and the state-run television headquarters.

Cocoa prices dropped 7.1 percent last week as traders predicted an imminent end to the impasse in the world’s largest cocoa producer. The crisis led the West African nation to default on its $2.3 billion of Eurobonds, which have rallied 30 percent in 10 days as Ouattara’s forces advance.

Duekoue Massacre

The Duekoue massacre occurred on March 29 and is a result of “inter-communal violence,” Red Cross spokeswoman Dorothea Krimitsas said in an interview from Geneva yesterday. About 1,000 people died or disappeared in the town between March 27 and March 29 and the humanitarian situation in Ivory Coast “is rapidly deteriorating,” the Roman Catholic aid group Caritas said on its website.

“Lots of people were lying dead in the streets” of Duekoue, Kelnor Panglung, a spokesman for the Red Cross in Ivory Coast, said from Abidjan. “We could see a lot, a lot, a lot of people killed. It’s truly horrific. We don’t have any information about the authors of these killings.”

Ouattara’s administration called for an international investigation into the killings and denied its forces were involved in any human-rights abuses in the west of the country, according to an e-mailed statement from the Justice Ministry.

‘International Courts’

Ouattara will “ensure strict observance of human rights and bring all perpetrators of abuses against civilians to justice in national and international courts,” it said.

The UN said yesterday four of its peacekeepers were seriously wounded after coming under attack near Abidjan by forces loyal to Gbagbo, and warned troops loyal to Ouattara to “show restraint” after what the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights called “unconfirmed but worrying” reports of looting, extortion, abductions and ill treatment of civilians.

Aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres said even though major fighting between the groups seems to have ended in the western part of the country, “the situation nonetheless remains extremely tense and violent in and around several cities in the region.”

The UN said on March 31 that Liberian mercenaries loyal to Gbagbo were killing and looting in other areas in the west of the country, putting the death toll since the election at 494.

Abidjan Toll

The death toll in Abidjan, located on the southeast coast, isn’t known. MSF said it treated 37 wounded on April 1, including 30 with gunshot wounds.

“Medical facilities across Ivory Coast can no longer provide medications and they lack basic medical equipment,” the group said.

Abidjan is the first place where Ouattara’s forces have met resistance from Gbagbo’s troops. Each side claimed to control the headquarters of the state-owned broadcaster, Radio Television Ivoirienne, RTI. The station came back on the air yesterday and issued a bulletin saying that Gbagbo was still at his residence. The broadcasts came from a van parked on a fly- over and not from the studio, Sindou said.

John Atta Mills, the president of Ghana, “has indicated his willingness to give political asylum to President Gbagbo if he asks for it,” spokesman Koku Anyidoho said in an interview broadcast on Accra-based Radio Gold yesterday. Gbagbo hadn’t yet asked for asylum, he said.

Gbagbo’s spokesman denied speculation he fled the country.

“Laurent Gbagbo is in his residence with his family,” Ahoua Don Mello said in an interview. “We call for negotiations. Ivorian society is divided and we need to heal it.”

--With assistance from Baudelaire Mieu in Anbidjan and Moses Mozart Dzawu in Accra and Susan Decker in Washington. Editors: Paul Tighe, Paul Richardson.

Source Code or Insidious took second place.

Haiti Cholera Epidemic Could Sicken 779,000 This Year

The cholera epidemic in Haiti this year will be far worse than the 400,000 cases predicted by the United Nations, new study findings indicate.

There could be nearly twice as many cases of the potentially deadly diarrheal disease -- an estimated 779,000 -- between March and November of this year, according to researchers at the University of California, San Francisco and Harvard Medical School.

The discrepancy is important because U.N. projections determine the allocation of resources to fight the disease, said the authors of the study, published March 16 in The Lancet.

"The epidemic is not likely to be short-term," Dr. Sanjay Basu, a UCSF medical resident, said in a university news release. "It is going to be larger than predicted in terms of sheer numbers and will last far longer than the initial projections."

The cholera epidemic erupted in Haiti after last year's devastating earthquake. Cholera -- spread from person-to-person through contaminated food and water -- can be deadly if untreated. In most cases, treatment for the diarrhea caused by the disease involves rehydration with salty liquids.

Late last year, the U.N. projected that a total of 400,000 people in Haiti would eventually become infected with cholera. They reached that total by assuming that cholera would infect 2 to 4 percent of Haiti's population of 10 million. But the U.N. estimate did not take into account existing disease trends, or factors such as where water was contaminated, how the disease is transmitted, or human immunity to cholera, Basu said.

Basu and colleague Dr. Jason Andrews, a fellow at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, used data from Haiti's Ministry of Health and other sources to develop a more sophisticated model of the spread of cholera in several provinces in Haiti.

That led to their predictions of 779,000 cases of cholera and about 11,100 deaths in the next eight months.

The researchers also examined the impact of making clean water more available and the use of vaccines or antibiotics. They found that a 1 percent decrease in the number of people who drink contaminated water would prevent more than 100,000 cases of cholera and about 1,500 deaths this year.

In addition, simply offering vaccination to an estimated 10 percent of the population could save about 900 lives, and more widespread use of antibiotics could prevent 9,000 cases of cholera and about 1,300 deaths.

Gaddafi forces attack rebels anew, even as regime appears to seek talks

Government and rebel forces engaged in a fierce battle Monday for control of this oil depot on the Mediterranean coast, as regime loyalists mounted assaults on several fronts to reclaim ground lost since the Feb. 17 uprising began.

In a second day of heavy fighting for control of Ras Lanuf, the site of a major oil refinery east of Tripoli, loyalists bombarded the town with airstrikes. To the west, the besieged rebel-held city of Zawiyah faced a fourth straight day of lethal assault.

But with neither side able to muster overwhelming force, the result appeared to be a bloody stalemate, with the death tolls rising in both east and west from the burgeoning civil war over Moammar Gaddafi's 41-year-long rule.

"Yesterday, we were so optimistic," said Najla el-Mangoush, a law professor who works with the opposition's governing council in the eastern city of Benghazi. "Now I'm worried about what's happening." He said that Gaddafi "has used every dirty trick on us."

In an apparent government overture, a former Libyan prime minister appeared on state television to make what was called a direct appeal to the leaders of the opposition in Benghazi, the rebels' provisional capital.

"Give a chance to national dialogue to resolve this crisis, to help stop the bloodshed, and not give a chance to foreigners to come and capture our country again," said Jadallah Azous al-Talhi, who was prime minister in the 1980s.

The opposition, however, dismissed the notion of peace talks. "They've been asking for contact, but the council has refused," said Jalal el-Gallal, a spokesman with the opposition in Benghazi, referring to the revolutionaries' governing committee. Mohamed Fanoush, a member of the Benghazi city council who is allied with the opposition, also said overtures from Gaddafi's regime had been rejected out of hand. "The answer was: 'There will be no negotiations as long as you are killing Libyans,' " Fanoush said.

In the western city of Zawiyah, a rebel spokesman speaking by satellite phone said Gaddafi's troops had rolled into the city with tanks for a fourth day Monday. Phone, electricity and Internet services had been cut. "They demolished the mosque, came into the square, but after seven hours, we beat them back," said the spokesman, Mohamed Magid.

He said that at least 10 rebels were killed and more than 30 wounded in what he described as fierce urban warfare. "For a fourth day, they have come, and for a fourth day, we have beat them back. But they are still on the east, west and south of the city, and they are going to return. . . . We are low on supplies, medicines. We need support. We need help."

Another rebel-held city, Misurata, which is Libya's third largest, appeared quiet most of Monday, after weathering a major assault by government troops Sunday. A rebel spokesman at a Misurata hospital, Abed el-Salam Bayo, said 21 opposition fighters and civilians were killed along with 19 government troops. As night fell Monday, door-to-door alerts warned residents that loyalist tanks were again approaching.

"We still fear another attack, so everyone is preparing molotov cocktails that we are making from Pepsi-Cola bottles," said Salah Abed El-Aziz, a 60-year-old architect in Misurata. "The morale in the city is very high. It was a beautiful battle; the price was high. But this is the price we have to pay for our freedom."

In Ras Lanuf, which was seized by rebels Friday, the government launched a morning air attack. At least one bomb fell inside the grounds of an ethylene refinery, where chemical storage tanks posed a major risk of explosion. Although the Libyan jets dropped bombs in the area throughout the day, Gallal said that there had been no ground fighting and that rebels maintained control of the city.

"Ras Lanuf is definitely in the hands of the rebels," Gallal said. "But the other guys are well dug in." At least for now, the government appears to have succeeded in holding off what the rebels hoped would be a push westward to Sirte, a government stronghold halfway between Benghazi and Tripoli that is Gaddafi's home town.

Gaddafi made an appearance on state television Monday that was inexplicably cut short. He got more time in during an interview with a French television network, during which he said Libya was an important partner of the West and attempted to paint the rebels as al-Qaeda operatives.

Nearly 200,000 people have fled Libya since the fighting began, according to the United Nations, which said Monday that it expects the number to double over the next three months. In all, as many as 1 million Libyans and migrant workers will require assistance, the United Nations said in issuing an appeal for $160 million to cover the costs.

A summary of the appeal said that although "the clearest humanitarian needs" stem from the outflow of people fleeing the crisis, "there are likely to be many more migrants within Libya who want to leave" but have been unable to do so.

U.N. officials cautioned that the estimate is preliminary and that they do not have a complete picture of the extent of need in Libya, particularly in government-controlled Tripoli and the conflict zone in the west. Over the weekend, Libyan Foreign Minister Musa Kusa acceded to a request by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to send an assessment team to Tripoli to determine the extend of Libya's humanitarian needs. But as of Monday, the U.N. team had not been given the visas and guarantees of unhindered access it needs to carry out its work.

Ban has named Abdul-Illah Khatib, a former Jordanian foreign minister, as a special U.N. envoy to Libya. Khatib has been directed to consult with Libyan authorities and others in the region "on the immediate humanitarian situation as well as the wider dimensions of the crisis."