BENGHAZI, Libya – Libyan rebels continued hunting this week for Muammar Gaddafi and battled the remnants of his forces after overrunning his Tripoli compound, as the strongman urged residents to cleanse the capital “of rats.”

Rebels trample on a Gaddafi statue in Bab al-Aziziya.

Two powerful blasts thought to be caused by an air attack rocked the capital early in the morning on Wednesday as a NATO warplane flew overhead.

The explosions came during a night of shooting as fighting continued following the storming of Gathafi’s Bab al-Azizya compound by rebel fighters on Tuesday.

The leader of a rebel group told an AFP correspondent that pro-Gaddafi fighters were hidden on the road to Tripoli airport.

On the run and his whereabouts unknown, a defiant Gaddafi delivered two messages during the night.

In a speech carried by the website of a television station headed by his son Seif al-Islam, he said he had abandoned his Tripoli compound in a “tactical withdrawal” after it had been wrecked by NATO warplanes.

“Bab al-Azizya was nothing but a heap of rubble after it was the target of 64 NATO missiles and we withdrew from it for tactical reasons,” he said.

The speech gave no indication of where he had gone.

In a later audio message on Syrian-based Arrai Oruba television station, Gaddafi urged residents to “cleanse Tripoli of rats.”

He also said he had taken to the streets of Tripoli without being recognized.

“I walked incognito, without anyone seeing me, and I saw youths ready to defend their city,” the strongman said, without specifying when he did his walkabout.

Jumpy but jubilant rebels armed with assault rifles, meanwhile, combed the streets of the capital Wednesday for remnants of the regime.

“We are the champions. We’ve been dying for 42 years and now we are going to live,” said Sharif Sohail, a 34-year-old dentist who took up arms to patrol the city center.

Meanwhile, more than 20,000 people have been killed in the six-month rebellion to oust Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, rebel leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil said on Thursday.

“I do not have the exact figure, but the armed conflict has resulted in more than 20,000 dead,” said Abdel Jalil, head of the rebel Transitional National Council.

Asked about the possible presence of chemical weapons in the country, he said there was nothing to fear.

“As a former member of the (Gaddafi) regime, I know very well that those weapons have expired,” he said.

Jalil said on Thursday that foreign countries which backed Libya’s revolt would be rewarded with contracts in the state’s post-war reconstruction.

“We promise to favor the countries which helped us, especially in the development of Libya. We will deal with them according to the support which they gave us,” he told a news conference in the eastern city of Benghazi.

Jalil, the National Transitional Council (TNC) chairman, thanked countries which took part in NATO’s military operations against longtime strongman Muammar Gaddafi and those which unblocked Libya’s frozen assets abroad.

On the political front, he said six more TNC members would travel to Tripoli on Friday as part of preparations to base a post-Gaddafi government in the capital, following the dispatch of several other council members.

The International Monetary Fund is monitoring the civil war in Libya and will consider recognizing any internationally recognized new government in Tripoli, a spokesman said Thursday.

“When there is a clear and broad-based international recognition of a new government in Libya, it is at that point that the Fund would or could move toward recognition,” IMF spokesman David Hawley said at a regularly scheduled news briefing.

“The Fund is monitoring developments in Libya and hopes that there will be a prompt end to this civil conflict,” he said.

The spokesman reiterated that the Fund stands ready to support any member country, but said that the nature of its future relations with Libya “will depend on the wishes of an internationally recognized government.”

At press time, Qaddafi’s whereabouts were still unknown.