Gaddafi bastion gunmen stubborn as town suffers

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Gaddafi bastion gunmen stubborn as town suffers

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Bani Walid remains stubbornly in hands of die-hard gunmen raring to fight for their deposed leader.

07 September,2011 08:53 pm

Haunted by gun-toting loyalists and festooned with faded portraits of Muammar Gaddafi, the besieged Libyan town of Bani Walid remains stubbornly in the hands of die-hard gunmen raring to fight for their deposed leader.Anti-Gaddafi fighters at the gates of Bani Walid, one of the last remaining strongholds of the old regime, have so far failed to convince the town’s pro-Gaddafi masters to lay down their arms and surrender.Outside the town, Bani Walid residents passing through a sun-scorched checkpoint of anti-Gaddafi forces set up around the nearby desert settlement of Wishtata painted an increasingly desperate picture inside their town.Inside Bani Walid, tucked away in barren hills about 150 km south of the capital Tripoli, Gaddafi’s green flags still fly above households and a huge portrait of Gaddafi in military uniform towers above its central square.Shooting in the air and yelling insults from the back of their pickup trucks, packs of Gaddafi loyalists regularly speed through the streets, according to residents.