Gaddafi threatens Europe if NATO presses air war

Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has threatened retaliation against Europe unless NATO ceases its operations, warning loyalist forces can launch stinging attacks like "locusts and bees."

"The Libyan people are capable, one day, of taking the battle to Europe and the Mediterranean," Gaddafi said yesterday in a speech broadcast by loudspeaker to thousands of loyalists gathered in Tripoli's emblematic Green Square.

"They could attack your homes, your offices, your families (who) could become legitimate military targets because you have transformed our offices, headquarters, homes and children into military targets which you say are legitimate," Gaddafi said.

"If we decide to do so, we are capable of throwing ourselves on Europe like swarms of locusts or bees.

"So we advise you to backtrack before you face a catastrophe," he warned in a speech to mark 100 days of the military campaign by NATO countries against the North African country.

Gaddafi's regime has earned notoriety over the four decades since he seized power in 1969, arming militant groups from Northern Ireland to the Philippines, and being held responsible for a string of bombings against Western targets, including in Europe.

A Libyan agent, Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet al-Megrahi, was convicted of the 1988 bombing of Pan Am flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, which killed 270 people, most of them US nationals.