WORLD IN BRIEF : LIBYA : Kadafi Calls Reports of Uprising a Lie

Libyan leader Moammar Kadafi has described reports of a military uprising against him as “a blatant lie.” In a speech to university faculty and students carried on Libyan television, Kadafi denied Western reports that he had called out the air force to put down a rebellion at an army base near Misratah, east of the Libyan capital, Tripoli. Kadafi accused the British Broadcasting Corp. and the British intelligence service of fabricating the stories to demoralize the Libyan people. “We have in front of us a blatant lie,” Kadafi said. “We are the witnesses and we know that nothing has happened, whether in Misratah or anywhere else, that no plane moved and that there was no rebellion.”