White House invites Libyan rebel

The leader of a Libyan opposition group is to meet senior US officials and members of Congress on Friday, the White House has said.

Mahmoud Jibril, president of the Libyan Transitional National Council’s executive bureau, will meet National Security Adviser Tom Donilon.

He was in Washington to give a talk at the Brookings Institution think tank.

Rebels have been fighting Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi since February, with Nato also targeting his forces.

Mr Jibril has been forming plans for a post-Gaddafi Libya, including an interim government that would immediately take over to provide day-to-day governance and keep order.

The caretaker government would include members from the Transitional National Council, technocrats from the Gaddafi regime, senior military and intelligence officers and a supreme court judge, he said last week.

Meanwhile, Mr Jibril has been pushing for diplomatic recognition of the council, for access to frozen Libyan assets and for further humanitarian and military support.

After months of fighting, a group of rebels remain holed up in the western city of Misrata, where they have come under heavy attack by government forces.

On Wednesday the rebels said they had seized Misrata airport in the west, driving back pro-Gaddafi troops.

Rebel forces are mostly concentrated in strongholds in the east of the country.