Not up to NATO to arrest Gaddafi: alliance

NATO said Tuesday that Moamer Kadhafi belonged in court but that it was not up to the alliance to arrest him, as it vowed no "pause" in the air war. NATO welcomed the arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court against Kadhafi, his son and his intelligence chief for crimes against humanity. "The arrest warrants are yet another signal from the international community to the Kadhafi regime: Your place is on trial, not in power in Tripoli," NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu told a news briefing. "It is not for NATO to enforce that warrant, that is for the appropriate authorities," Lungescu said. "Our mandate is to protect civilians from attack." NATO is operating under a UN mandate that forbids the deployment of ground troops in Libya, making any arrest impossible for the alliance. This week the 28-nation alliance marks three months since it took command of aerial and naval operations from a coalition led by France, Britain and the United States on March 31. Lieutenant General Charles Bouchard, the operation's commander, said the mission had made "significant" progress, bringing normalcy to the rebel-held east while the opposition has scored "significant successes" in the west. But he dismissed a suggestion that the situation on the ground meant that NATO could scale back its operations, warning that shelling continues in Misrata and Nalut while Kadhafi forces build up in the Brega area. "No, I do not believe that any scaling down of operation is appropriate nor required at this time. In fact we stay the course," Bouchard said via videolink from his headquarters in Naples, Italy. The Canadian general said NATO would keep up the pressure until Kadhafi stops threatening civilians, returns his forces to barracks and allows humanitarian aid to flow freely into Libya. "We will continue our mission without pause until we have reached those objectives," he said. Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini, whose country is taking part in the NATO operations, last week called for a suspension of the campaign as he criticised the first case of accidental civilian deaths caused by NATO.