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Live: Libya revolt

1155 Ras Lanuf hospital has been evacuated after a nearby rocket attack, says an AFP reporter.

1154 As commentators debate whether the UK and others should implement a no-fly zone in Libya, the BBC has rounded up some contrasting views on the topic. Former US Air Force chief Gen Merrill McPeak thinks it would be easy to impose, while the former commander of UN forces in Bosnia, Bob Stewart, disagrees.

1148 Urgent efforts are under way to establish the whereabouts of the Guardian correspondent Ghaith Abdul-Ahad, the newspaper reports. He last made contact with the newspaper on Sunday. He was travelling with Andrei Netto of the Brazilian newspaper Estado de Sao Paulo, who is also missing.

1145 Jeel Ghathub tweets: "#Libya's central bank has ordered banks to recirculate old currency. This is a sign that #Gaddafi is facing liquidity problems".

1144 Warplanes sent by forces loyal to Col Gaddafi have bombed the oil town of Brega - about 90 km (56 miles) east of Ras Lanuf - reports Reuters, extending attacks deeper into rebel-held territory in the east of Libya, rebels reported. Brega has not been targeted for several days.

1141 Cassandra Nelson, Mercy Corps humanitarian aid worker  tweets:" Huge Opposition rally Friday in Benghazi. Local leaders from many east #Libya towns expected."

1140 A Libyan news agency says it is in possession of a "grave" secret that could topple French President Nicolas Sarkozy, BBC Monitoring reports. "Al-Jamahiriyah news agency learnt today there is a grave secret that would definitely lead to the toppling of Sarkozy and perhaps his trial. The secret is related to the funding of his electoral campaign," said an urgent caption on Libyan TV.

1134 Italy is to seek the opinion of other EU countries before deciding whether to recognise the Libyan Transitional National Council, says Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi according to Reuters.

1130 A rebel in Brega tells the BBC that Col Gaddafi's air forces attacked in the last few minutes. "It wasn't in the residential area, but close to a group of rebels at a checkpoint," he says. "The air strikes are our biggest problem. We really can't handle them, can't control them. We need a no-fly zone in order to be able to move forward and go to Tripoli."

1127 Portuguese Foreign Minister Luis Amado says he has sent a message to Col Gaddafi through a Tripoli envoy saying: "The Gaddafi regime is over", reports AFP news agency.

1123 Fighting with heavy weapons is continuing in Bin Jawad and Ras Lanuf, a resident of Ajdabiya who has regular contacts with rebels from the frontline of the fighting told BBC Arabic. He said three people had died and five injured people were rushed to Ajdabiya hospital today and that the rebels had regained Bin Jawad.

1120 There is a flurry of diplomatic activity going on in Europe, reports the BBC's Matthew Price in Brussels. As Paris meets Libyan rebel envoys, the Greek foreign minister also met an envoy for Col Gaddafi's government this morning. "I sense we're moving into a diplomatic phase," our correspondent says. "Nobody wants military action because they fear getting bogged down in Libya. There may be the beginnings of a diplomatic solution to what's happening now."

1118 Ali Essawi, formerly Col Gaddafi's ambassador to India who defected, has just announced in Paris that not only is France recognising the Libyan opposition Transitional National Council as the sole legitimate representative of the Libyan people but that a French envoy will be sent to Benghazi, reports private French news channel La Chaine Info.

1057 Peter Beaumont, Observer foreign affairs editor tweets: "Hearing that now Libyan authorities trying to take laptops off journalists leaving Tripoli airport along with SIM cards." He later adds: "Less and less flights leaving Tripoli. Tunisair stopped as of last night. Soon we'll be unable to fly out."

1047 France is the first country to officially recognise the Transitional Council. It is unclear whether other EU countries will follow suit, as the policy is usually to recognise the legitimacy of states, not governments.

1042 AFP reports that two shells have landed in the centre of the oil town of Ras Lanuf, hitting the ground near a hospital.

1040 After the announcement that France has recognised the rebel council, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has urged other EU states to engage in dialogue with its leaders, AFP reports.

1039 kazkazom tweets: "Big thank u 2 France for standing on the side of Libyan people. We will never forget u were the first 2 accept our TNC [Transitional National Council]."

1035 More from Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. He said it was clearly stated in the UN charter and international accords that "each nation has the right to decide its own future". As such, he said, "intervention in internal affairs, especially military interference, is unacceptable".


1030 With all supplies usually coming from Tripoli, the Misrata doctor said vaccinations and milk for babies are starting to run out and chemotherapy drugs are in short supply. He said the situation in the city remains quiet at the moment - rebel supporters have full control following attacks by government forces over the weekend. But he is expecting another pro-Gaddafi attack soon.

1028 A doctor working in Misrata has told the BBC he expects his hospital's supply of anaesthetic to run out in less than one week. The hospital is also low on resources for dialysis - 300 of their patients would die within one day if they become unable to receive the treatment, he says.

1027 Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has been asked by a reporter of state TV whether Russia would support a UN Security Council resolution to introduce a no-fly zone over Libya, reports BBC Monitoring. Mr Lavrov said: "This is clearly a hypothetical question, because nobody on the Security Council has introduced any proposals yet."

1021 Libya has descended into civil war, the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said at a news conference. Jakob Kellenberger called on Libyan authorities to grant the humanitarian agency access to western areas including the capital Tripoli and reminded both sides that civilians and medical facilities must not be targeted.

1018 The BBC's Pascale Harter in Benghazi says joyful expectation has given way to grim determination there. But everyone says they are in the fight against Col Gaddafi for the long haul. The Transitional National Council can't understand why it's taking the international community so long to act, she says.

1005 France recognises the Libyan Transitional National Council as the sole legitimate representative of the Libyan people, says the office of President Nicolas Sarkozy according to Reuters.

1003 The president of the International Red Cross says doctors in the Libyan towns of Ajdabiya and Misrata are seeing a dramatic rise in the number of casualties, mostly civilians, following heavy fighting and air strikes. Jakob Kellenberger says the aid organisation is cut off from access in western areas including Tripoli but believes those are "even more severely affected by the fighting" than eastern rebel-held territories.

0958 There is more confirmation that Zawiya has been won back by government forces, with a witness saying as much to AFP news agency.

0956 Josh Rogin, writing on Foreign Policy blog, says: "Though the Obama administration hasn't yet decided whether or how to aid the Libyan opposition, the White House is working to stop the flow of mercenaries fighting for [Gaddafi] entering the country from countries surrounding Libya like Chad and Niger."

0955Caroline Thomas in Zarziss, Tunisia, writes: "Although we are no longer in Libya, we are in phone contact with friends in Tripoli... Since the first Tripoli uprising, the night of 21 February, most of the population have been trapped in their houses... One friend has recently told us that the families of the dead protesters are too afraid to take the bodies to the cemetery, so they are burying them in their gardens, or keeping them in their apartments with air con on very cold to try to preserve them. These are their dead sons, brothers, husbands, fathers. Everybody we speak to in Tripoli say they are absolutely terrified of Gaddafi's forces."

Have Your Say

0952 But Ahmed Jibril - an adviser to the Transitional National Council set up by Libyan rebels in Benghazi - calls upon the international community to act urgently and carry out air strikes on Col Gaddafi's assets. "The people are determined to have a new state based on institutions, respect for international law and human rights. We have breathed the air of freedom and are not willing to give it up," he tells the BBC.

0950 "Intervention tends to go wrong - it tends to have consequences that are the opposite of what you meant," Jeremy Greenstock - who was the UK's ambassador to the UN in the run-up to the US-led invasion of Iraq - tells the BBC. He reels off a list of countries where a case for intervention could be made, and asks: "Where will you draw the line?"

0940 Ghazi Gheblawi tweets: "in #Sirte they can hear fighting and bombing outside the city coming from the east towards #BinJawad, and today it was intense #Libya".

0938 "I can't imagine an easier military problem," Gen Merrill McPeak, a former US Air Force chief of staff, has said of the imposition of a no-fly zone in a Nicholas D Kristof op-ed piece in the New York Times. "'If we can't do this, what can we do?' he asked, adding: 'I think it would have a real impact. It might change their calculation of who might come out on top. Just the mere announcement of this might have an impact.'"

0930 Sybella Wilkes from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) tweets: " V.worried about 50 Eritrean + Ethiopian refugees- detained and sent to Twesha detention centre near#Tripoli #Libya".

0925 Panos Haritos tweets: "#Gaddafy artillery pounding #Ras Lanouf residential area. Ambulances evacuate injured rebel fighters to Azedabia, #Libya (via phone)."

0921 Mario Vanella tweets: "Reports that artillery assault on #raslanuf by pro-gov forces now on 3 sides. From sea to nth, desert to sth, road to west #libya."

0917 On the air raid which reports suggest has been taking place in the oil port of Ras Lanuf, a Reuters witness says bombs or missiles are landing a few kilometres from Ras Lanuf oil refinery and close to a Libyan Emirates Oil Referiny Company (LERCO) building. "One bomb landed on a civilian house in Ras Lanuf," rebel fighter Izeddine Sheikhy said. A warplane was said to be circling over Ras Lanuf.

0911 Col Gaddafi would agree to talks on the transition of power, Portuguese daily Publico on Thursday quoted a diplomatic source as saying a day after Foreign Minister Luis Amado met a Gaddafi envoy in Lisbon. But the source said it was too early to assess the sincerity of the statement.

0856 Although some commentators argue that a no-fly zone would have little impact on Col Gaddafi - whose forces appear, for example, to have succeeded in reclaiming Zawiya through a ground campaign - the BBC's Wyre Davies points out that much of the government effort to retake important rebel-held territory in the east hinges on an air campaign.

0851 In France, members of the Libyan opposition are to meet President Nicolas Sarkozy. Eric Rouleau, a former French ambassador who knows Libya well, says the talks show that "the French government is prepared to deal with the [Benghazi-based opposition grouping] National Libyan Council". "The French government was not enthusiastic about the Tunisian revolt and not enthusiastic about the Egyptian revolt, and now they are trying to demonstrate that France is strongly supporting the Libyan revolution," Mr Rouleau told the BBC World Service.

0845 An air strike has targeted Libyan rebel lines east of Ras Lanuf, an oil port on the westernmost edge of rebel-held territory in the east, reports AFP.

0842 An envoy for the Libyan government is to meet Greek Deputy Foreign Minister Dimitris Dollis on Thursday, reports Reuters.


0830 The BBC's Pascale Harter in Benghazi says Russia's ban on arms sales to Libya will have little discernable effect on the ground in Libya for some time, as Col Gaddafi has huge stockpiles of weapons.

0826 A Yemen opposition spokesman has said President Saleh's offer of reforms (see earlier entry) comes too late and does not meet protesters' demands, says Reuters.

0824 Brazilian newspaper Estado de Sao Paulo says it has lost all contact with its reporter in Zawiya. The newspaper says it has unconfirmed information that 34-year-old Andrei Netto was placed under arrest, along with another Libyan journalist and a guide. The editors have not been able to contact Mr Netto since Sunday. The Brazilian embassy is looking into the matter.

0820 The UK Defence Secretary Liam Fox has told the BBC he believes we are seeing a "relative stalemate between the military forces" in Libya. "The regime itself is digging in around Tripoli. It is able to protect its own areas and the oil installations but it doesn't seem to have the military mass to move decisively against the rebel forces and the reverse is true. What that potentially means is a lot of suffering for the people of Libya and the best result for the whole country is for Col Gaddafi to realise he is a liability to his country and people, and to leave."

0814 The EU is set to unveil new financial sanctions on Col Gaddafi's government today, says the BBC's business reporter Mark Gregory. It is expected to announce plans to freeze assets and stop transactions involving the Libyan central bank and several of the country's commercial banks. It is also likely to target the Libyan Investment Authority - a sovereign fund which invests the country's oil wealth and enjoys stakes in Italian banks, Juventus football team and the company that owns the Financial times newspaper.



0807 The BBC's Matthew Price in Brussels says no formal decisions or major announcements are expected from the Nato defence ministers meeting today - they are likely instead privately to draw up contingency plans. EU and Nato officials all insist any action in Libya will have to be driven by a UN Security Council resolution.

0756 Ahead of a Nato meeting to discuss the possibility of a no-fly zone, a Libyan doctor living in the UK, Dr Ahmed Sewelhi, whose father and three brothers were arrested for speaking out about Col Gaddafi's regime, tells the BBC: "My mother called me from Tripoli two days ago... saying 'please ask the West for help, we need a no-fly zone, there's too many people being killed'. And she was just crying and crying. And the people, both in Benghazi and in Tripoli and in Misrata and in Zawiya are just crying out for help and nobody is listening to them. Gaddafi was armed by the West, I think it's time for the Western governments to listen to the people."

0748 Expanding on the news that Russia is to ban weapons sales to Libya, the Russian daily Kommersant apparently quoted a source last week as saying Russia had $2bn (£1.2bn) worth of arms contracts with Libya and was close to concluding deals to sell military aircraft and anti-aircraft missiles worth another $1.8bn.

0729 In a live speech currently being televised, the Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh has announced Yemen will move to a parliamentary system whereby a "government elected by the parliament will take control of the country's executive powers" and a new constitution will be adopted.

0725 Sources suggest that Zawiya, about 50km west of Tripoli, has in effect now fallen to government forces after five days of heavy bombardment, says the BBC's Wyre Davies in Tripoli. State TV is showing government troops and supporters inside the town. But he says that Zawiya is actually quite a small provincial town - the fight government forces have had to retake it suggests a massive show of force will be needed to retake towns in the east, where the rebels' position is stronger.

0717 Russia is to ban all weapons sales to Libya, the Kremlin says, effectively suspending its arms contracts with Col Muammar Gaddafi's government, according to Reuters news agency.

0715Welcome to the BBC's live coverage of events in Libya, where anti-government demonstrators are attempting to topple their ruler of the past 41 years, Col Muammar Gaddafi. Stay with us for the latest updates - reports from our correspondents on the ground, expert analysis, and your reaction from around the world. You can contact us via email, text or twitter. We'll publish what we can.

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