A Libyan diplomat in Bulgaria has been declared "persona non grata" and will have to leave the country within 24 hours, the foreign ministry announced Monday.

It did not say however why the consular adviser, Ibrahim al-Furis, was being asked to leave.

NATO warplanes blitzed a string of military targets in Tripoli on Sunday, an official said, as embattled Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi blamed a "colonial plot" for the conflict engulfing his country.

"In Tripoli there were two command and control nodes, two surface-to-air missile launchers and one anti-aircraft gun (hit)," a NATO official said from the mission's headquarters in Naples, Italy.

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi heaped praise on toppled Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak, describing him as "poor and modest" and saying he deserved honor rather than humiliation.

"I know Hosni Mubarak, a poor and modest man" who loves his people, Gadhafi said in an audio message broadcast on state television late Saturday to mark the anniversary of the 1952 coup in Egypt led by Gamal Abdel Nasser against the monarchy.

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's removal from power is not up for discussion, Foreign Minister Abdelati al-Obeidi said Wednesday following talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov.

"The question of Gadhafi's departure is not up for negotiation," Obeidi told reporters after an hour of talks with Russia's chief diplomat at Moscow's foreign ministry headquarters.

Military leaders from the rebel-held Libyan city of Misrata asked French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Wednesday for extra aid to defeat ruler Moammar Gadhafi, a member of their delegation said.

"Insurgent commanders came to explain to the head of state that the keys to Tripoli are in Misrata because Misrata's fighters are disciplined, battle hardened and they have a key asset: a military victory already won" against forces loyal to Gadhafi, Bernard-Henri Levy told Agence France Presse after the meeting.

France accepts Moammar Gadhafi could stay in Libya if he quits politics, under a ceasefire deal to end a conflict with rebels backed by Paris, the French foreign minister said on Wednesday.

"One of the possibilities being considered is that he stay in Libya but on the clear condition that he steps aside from Libyan political life," the minister, Alain Juppe, told LCI television.

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi's Foreign Minister Abdelati al-Obeidi is to visit Moscow for talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, reports said Tuesday.

Lavrov and al-Obeidi will discuss the current situation in Libya and African Union-led mediation efforts in the meeting on Wednesday afternoon in Moscow, Russian news agencies said, without giving further details.

Libya's rebels claimed control of Brega on Monday, as most pro-Gadhafi troops retreated westward leaving around 150-200 loyalist fighters pinned down inside the oil town, a spokesman said.

"The bulk of (Moammar) Gadhafi's forces have retreated to Ras Lanuf," rebel spokesman Shamsiddine Abdulmolah told Agence France Presse, referring to another oil hub some 50 kilometers to the west.

Russia on Monday refused to recognize the rebel National Transitional Council as Libya's official authority but said it would view it as a formal negotiating partner.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said last week's recognition by Western and regional powers of the opposition government at the expense of Moammar Gadhafi's regime was tantamount to picking sides in a civil war.

Libya is responsible for a deadly 1989 attack on a French airliner, Libyan former foreign minister Abdel Rahman Shalgam told the pan-Arab daily al-Hayat newspaper in an interview published on Monday.

"The Libyan security services blew up the plane. They believed that opposition leader Mohammed al-Megrief was on board, but after the plane was blown up, it was found that he was not on the plane," said Shalgam, who defected from Moammar Gadhafi's embattled regime earlier this year.