Speaking in the third person, Gaddafi said “I am not going to leave this land. I shall remain, defiant. Muammar is leader of the revolution until the end of time.”

The leader of the 42 year-old autocracy has reportedly used African mercenaries, snipers and even anti-aircraft missiles to target increasingly fractious demonstrators, with reports of 200-300 killed.

Referring to his green copy of the Libyan penal code, Gaddafi stated that anyone Libyan who “uses weapons against Libya will be sentenced to death.”

The public speech, he said, was intended to refute earlier reports in the international media that he had escaped to Venezuela.

A New York Times journalist in the country reported that much of the east appeared to now be under opposition control. Many of the protesters were armed, she observed.

The UN Security Council has meanwhile called for Gaddafi to cease his campaign of violence against his own people, deploring “the repression of peaceful demonstrators.”

Libya’s Deputy Ambassador to the UN, Ibrahim al-Dabashi, defected from Gaddafi’s regime and confirmed that the east of the country was no longer under government control. He said he had received reports of “genocide” occurring in the country’s west.

The UN Security Council’s message to Gaddafi was “not strong enough. But any message to the Libyan government at this stage is good,” he said.

As well as losing the UN delegation, Gaddafi has lost at least one military battalion and two air force colonels, who flew to Malta in their jets and requested asylum after refusing to bomb protesters.

The Maldives has meanwhile joined Jordan and Qatar among Muslim nations called for an emergency session of the UN Human Rights Council, on which Libya also sits.

Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed called on the international community to “strengthen measures to realise the aspirations of the Libyan people to fundamental rights and freedoms.”

“The right not to be tortured, the freedom to speak your mind, the ability to choose your own government… these liberties are not the preserve of Western nations but universal values to which everyone aspires,” Nasheed said. “These are the forces that are being played out on the streets of Libya and other countries of the Middle East.”

Established democracies had a responsibility to assist those who aspired to democracy and basic freedoms, he said.

Retired British MP Robert Key, who is currently visiting the Maldives for the first time since taking its case for democracy to the British parliament, said earlier this week that the Maldives had led “blazed a trail in promoting democracy and empowerment of the citizen, with all the difficulties that presents”, and could “hold its head high”.

“There will be leaders in North Africa who will be wishing they had listened to the Maldives, had done what the Maldives chose to do in 2008,” he said.

Oil prices spiked to US$106 a barrel on the back of ongoing unrest in the region.