Seif al-Islam, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's son, who was reported arrested by rebels on Sunday, is free.
He turned up early this morning at the hotel where foreign journalists stay in Tripoli and told them that the city is under his father's control.
He then took reporters in his convoy on a drive through parts of the city from the Rixus hotel to his father's compound.
Seif, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity, met with an AFP correspondent and two other journalists, just hours after ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo said rebel forces had arrested him.
"Tripoli is under our control. Everyone should rest assured. All is well in Tripoli," the defiant son of the Libyan strongman told the three journalists at a vacant lot outside his father's Bab al-Azizya compound in Tripoli early today.
"You have seen how the Libyan people rose up" to fight the rebels who arrived in Tripoli, he said, referring to battles in the capital between Gaddafi loyalists and rebel forces.
"The West has high-tech technology which disrupted telecommunications systems and sent messages to the people," declaring the fall of the regime, he said about text phone messages sent on Sunday to the residents of Tripoli.
"This is a technological and media war to cause chaos and terror in Libya," he added.
Seif al-Islam claimed the rebels had suffered "heavy casualties" yesterday when they stormed Gaddafi's compound.
"I am here to refute the lies," he said about reports of his arrest.
Meanwhile, Mohammed Gaddafi, the strongman's eldest son who also had been reported arrested, had escaped, the Libyan ambassador to Washington told CNN.
Ali Suleiman Aujali with the Libyan rebel National Transitional Council (NTC) told CNN that Mohammed was apparently taken by "maybe Gaddafi's forces." A senior rebel source confirmed the escape to AFP, saying "Yes, it's true, he has escaped." The source in the rebel capital of Benghazi, eastern Libya, spoke on condition of anonymity.
But the Libyan leader's whereabouts remained unknown, as the capital plunged into darkness after electricity supplies were turned off everywhere but his compound, and gunfire crackled around the Mediterranean port city.
He broadcast three defiant audio messages on Sunday, vowing he would not surrender and urging the people of Tripoli to "purge the capital," even as rebel forces swept through the capital and took over waterfront Green Square.