NATO air strikes, sinks eight warships of Dictator Gaddafi !

The NATO military alliance says it has sunk eight warships belonging to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's forces.

The ships were targeted in co-ordinated overnight attacks on the ports of Tripoli, Al Khums and Sirte, the alliance announced on Friday.

The deputy commander of the NATO mission in Libya said the air strikes were needed to protect civilians and NATO forces at sea.

Shelling was also heard in the Ghabat al-Qasr neighbourhood of the capital, Tripoli, in the early hours of Friday.

NATO, acting under a UN mandate, has been carrying out air strikes on Libya since Gaddafi used force to put down a revolt inspired by uprisings elsewhere in the Arab world.

In some of the latest strikes, NATO hit Gaddafi's forces around 15km east of the opposition-held town of Zintan in the Western Mountains region. The town and the port city of Misurata have seen some of the heaviest fighting in recent weeks.

Source; Aljazeera.net

NATO targets Libyan weapons depots - Freedom Fighters report coalition air strikes against anti democratic regime targets near Zintan, as well as strikes near Misurata.

NATO air attacks have hit anti democratic regime weapons depots near Zintan, southwest of Tripoli, the capital, according to a Freedom Fighter in the town.

Separately, two loud explosions rocked a western sector of Tripoli on Sunday as jets flew overhead, witnesses had told the AFP news agency.



An international coalition began carrying out attacks on forces loyal to Dictator Muammar Gaddafi, Libya's long-time ruler and destroyer, on March 19, under a UN mandate to protect civilians in the country. NATO took command of operations over Libya on March 31.

"NATO struck weapons depots five minutes ago in an area which lies about 30km southeast of Zintan," Abdulrahman, the freedom fighter, told the Reuters news agency by telephone on Sunday.

"We heard a loud explosion ... I think the strike hit some of them [the depots].

"We are now at a cemetery burying 11 people martyred during yesterday's fighting, in which 35 other fighters were also wounded."

The reported air raids came a week after the Libyan Regime said that Gaddafi's son, Saif al-Arab Gaddafi, and three of his grandchildren were killed in a NATO air strike on a compound in Tripoli but some believe that they had being murdered under the direct orders of Gaddafi in order to get back the support of civilians who are leaving him day by day..

Elsewhere in the country, freedom figters in the contested city of Misurata clashed with regime forces near the airport, a spokesman of pro democracy fighters told the Reuters news agency on Sunday.

"Fierce fighting is taking place now at the airport and in the air force college area [near the airport]. We are still hearing sounds of artillery and rockets," the spokesman, called Abdelsalam, said from Misurata.

"NATO struck an area in the east of Misurata today but we do not have details."


Meanwhile, Tunisia warned on Sunday that the repeated shelling from Libya of one of its border towns may force it to take measures to protect its sovereignty.

The country's official TAP news agency said that about 80 shells from Libya had fallen on Tunisian territory.


There were no reported injuries after the shells fell as Libyan troops fought with freedom figters to regain control of the Wazen-Dhehiba border post.

TAP quoted the Tunisian foreign ministry as warning that the country would take "all measures needed" within the law to ensure protection of its citizens, refugees and its territory.

Tunisia summoned Libya's ambassador on April 29 to complain after shells fell in inhabited areas. It now says Libya is not keeping to its commitments.

Meanwhile Italian coast guards and local fisherman saved all 528 refugees on a boat from Libya after their vessel hit rocks off the island of Lampedusa in an operation a rescuer described as a "miracle."

Among the refugees who had thrown themselves into the water at night were 24 pregnant women.

A building in the Dictator Gaddafi's compound flattened to the ground with heavy well targetted NATO air strikes!

NATO forces flattened a building inside Muammar Gaddafi's Bab al Aziziyah compound early on Monday.

Firefighters were still working to extinguish flames in a part of the ruined building a few hours after the attack, when foreign journalists were brought to the scene in Tripoli.




The press official, who asked not to be identified, said 45 people were hurt in the strike, 15 of them seriously, and some were still missing. That could not be independently confirmed.

Gaddafi's compound has been struck before, but NATO forces appear to be stepping up the pace of strikes in Tripoli in recent days.

A target nearby, which the regime called a car park but which appeared to cover a bunker, was hit two days ago.

The United States, Britain and France say they will not stop their air campaign over Libya until Dictator Gaddafi leaves power.

Washington has taken a backseat role in the air war since turning over command to NATO at the end of March but is under pressure to do more. This week it sent Predator drone air crafts which fired for the first time on Saturday still their is no sign of Dictator Gaddafi stepping down.

NATO ducks apology over rebel deaths - Second time with in 2 weeks

NATO concedes alliance air attacks "may have caused" the death of rebel fighters in tank strike outside Brega.

The deputy commander of NATO's operations in Libya has said he is "not apologising" for two air strikes which "may have led to the deaths" of a "a number of" opposition fighters outside the town of Brega.




Rear Admiral Russell Harding said in a press briefing on Tuesday that the situation on the ground had been "very fluid" when the strikes were launched a day earlier.He said tanks had been moving in different directions and that it was difficult to distinguish who was operating them.

"Until this time, we had not seen the TNC [Transitional National Council] operate tanks," he said.
General Abdelfatah Yunis, the rebel commander, said in Benghazi that four people - two fighters and two medics - were killed in the attack, 14 wounded and another six people were missing.

He said it was friendly fire, "carried out in error by NATO," adding that the freedon figters had now informed NATO that they were moving T55 and T72 heavy tanks from Benghazi to Brega.

He said that they still have 400 tanks and will get more in future.

Groups of fighters and civilians fled from the eastern town of Ajdabiya on Thursday after the air strikes.

Libyan state television claimed that forces loyal to longtime leader Muammar Gaddafi had entered Ajdabiya, but residents said they could see no sign of them.

NATO took command of the air operation last week after American, British and French air strikes halted Gaddafi's troops from advancing on Benghazi.


Freedom Figters say they need to buy more high-powered weaponry from abroad and would welcome foreign trainers to help them teach fighters how to use them, but so far no countries have acknowledged that they will sell weapons to the Freedom Figters.

On Thursday, however, General Younes said publicly for the first time that Qatar had provided the Freedom Figters with anti-tank weapons. Qatar was the second country to recognise the opposition Transitional National Council as Libya's legitimate government and has said it will market oil provided by freedom figters.

Libyan Freedom Figter's manage to regain ground near Brega - Libya Uprise Latest

Freedom Figter's claim regaining new ground in port town as Gaddafi's forces cripple oil production in eastern Libya

Pro-democracy fighters have regained ground in a new advance on the oil port of Brega in eastern Libya.

Rebels said the loss of ground early this week to forces loyal to Muammar Gaddafi is a normal occurrence in fluid desert wars, and will not prevent them from ousting the Libyan leader.

Meanwhile, NATO stepped up the pace of its air campaign over Libya on Wednesday, a day after facing fierce criticism of not doing enough to protect civilians in Misurata.

The alliance dismissed opposition criticisms saying the safety of civilians is its top priority and pledged to do everything it can to ensure that.

t accused Gaddafi's troops of hiding tanks, troops and heavy weapons among civilians to stop NATO aircrafts from air strikes.

On Tuesday Gaddafi's forces pushed back rebels from Brega in the pro-democracy movement's first significant loss of territory in almost a week.

"This kind of desert fight is very fluid; advancing 20 kilometres and then retreating 20 kilometres is normal in a desert war," Mustafa Gheriani, a rebel spokesman, said.

"Look at the desert war during the Second World War, around [the eastern Libyan town of] Tobruk: they were moving by 50 kilometres every day."

Gheriani said "our forces are at the eastern border of the city, the [Gaddafi] militias are inside the city and the fight is going on".

He said Gaddafi's army "has a lot of weapons left" and can threaten Ajdabiya, about 80 kilometres further east, "but we hope our resolve and most of all the resolve of NATO will prevent them to do that".