By Maria Golovnina
NEAR BANI WALID, Libya (Reuters) - Talks to end a standoff around the besieged Libyan town of Bani Walid broke down on Sunday, said a negotiator for fighters hunting Muammar Gaddafi.
"As chief negotiator, I have nothing to offer right now. From my side, negotiations are finished," Abdallah Kanshil told reporters at the site of earlier talks with tribal elders from the town, one of the last bastions of support for Gaddafi.
No comment was available from the other side.
Kanshil said: "They said they don't want to talk, they are threatening everyone who moves. They are putting snipers on high rise buildings and inside olive groves, they have a big fire force. We compromised a lot at the last minute."
"We will leave this for the field commanders to decide, for the NTC to decide what to do next," he said of the interim authority, the National Transitional Council.
He said he believed that two of Gaddafi's sons and his spokesman Moussa Ibrahim were in Bani Walid.
Tribal elders from Bani Walid, a bastion of support for Muammar Gaddafi, came out to negotiate after NTC spokesmen had said a several times over the previous day that talks were over and they were about to attack.
There has been speculation from NTC officials that members of the Gaddafi family, even the former Libyan leader himself, may be hiding in the town.
NTC commanders at the checkpoint said they suspected Gaddafi's most politically-prominent son, Saif al-Islam, may have fled the town on Saturday and headed deeper into the southern desert.
One NTC commander said that about 20 pro-Gaddafi fighters still controlled the centre of Bani Walid, though other NTC officials estimated there may be as many as 100 fighters waiting in the town.
Bani Walid, along with Gaddafi's hometown of Sirte and Sabha, deep in the Sahara desert, are three of the last main areas not under NTC control, though its forces are massed nearby.
Independent accounts from inside the towns have not been available as communications appear to be largely cut off.
(Writing by Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Rosalind Russell)
