Monday, April 25, 2011

Misurata, fighting has increased "There seems to be a policy to attack civilians with mortar fire. A residential district here has recieved 16 hits, which took out two schools,

(All times are local in Libya GMT+2)
  • 3:14pm
    Al Jazeera's Andrew Simmons, reporting from the besieged city of Misurata, said that fighting has increased in intensity.

     "There seems to be a policy to attack civilians with mortar fire. A residential district here has recieved 16 hits, which took out two schools, and we don't know the exact casualty figures in these schools," he said.

    "What we do know is it may be quite high, considering that pro-Gaddafi forces are using what is termed as indirect fire - essentially lobbying shells and tank rounds to terrorise the population."
  • 1:22pm
    Meanwhile, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the Libyan leader's son, struck a tone of defiance. He claimed that Gaddafi has "millions of Libyans with him" and said NATO's mission was doomed to fail.

    "The bombing which targeted Muammar Gaddafi's office today...will only scare children. It's impossible that it will make us afraid or give up or raise the white flag," he was quoted as saying by the Jana state news agency.

    "You, NATO, are waging a losing battle because you are backed by traitors and spies. History has proved that no state can rely on them to win."
  • 1:20pm
    In Brussels, a NATO spokesman said the alliance is increasingly targeting facilities linked to Gaddafi's regime with government advances stalled on the battlefield.

    "We have moved on to those command and control facilities that are used to coordinate such attacks by regime forces," the spokesman said of the strike on Bab al-Azizya.

    The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with military briefing regulations.
  • 1:15pm
    Theodore Karasik, defence analyst at the Institute for Near East and Gulf Military analysis, speaks to Al Jazeera. You can watch it here.
  • 12:55pm
    AFP reports that four people were killed as Gaddafi's forces blasted the town of Zintan in western Libya with Grad rockets, residents said on Monday.

    They said four people died and nine were wounded late on Sunday when government troops fired between six and nine Grads which crashed into homes.

    The mountainous area of Zintan, which borders Tunisia, was one of the first to rise up against Gaddafi's regime in March.
  • 12:39pm
    As thousands have fled violence in the now deserted Libyan city of Ajdabiya, a small group of bakeries struggled to feed those that remain, AP news agency reports.

    A long queue of men waited for hours on Sunday outside Khaleel El Oreby's bakery, one of only two working bakeries in the town of 50-thousand, to buy fresh bread to feed their families.

    "This bakery is open from 7 in the morning to 7 at night and we have stayed open from the start of the revolution until now, but we have a bread shortage and are unable to feed everyone in Ajdabiya," said Khaleel El Oreby, owner of the bakery.
  • 12:22pm
    According to AFP, a Kazakh man who tried to hijack a Paris-Rome flight and divert it to the Libyan capital Tripoli suffers from depression and has no links to terrorism, Italy's ANSA news agency reported on Monday.

    Police questioned Valery Tolmashev, 48, for five hours after he threatened a flight attendant with a small knife or nail file on the Alitalia flight at around 1930 GMT on Sunday.
  • 12:08pm
    Al Jazeera's Andrew Simmons updates from Misurata
  • 10:11 am
    Here is an update by Al Jazeera's correspondent, Mike Hanna, from Benghazi
  • 8:43am
    Moving to the front line in the fighting, is the western city of Misurata. There has been a barrage of heavy shelling by Gaddafi's forces against opposition fighters in the city.

    Al Jazeera's Andrew Simmons has the latest.
  • 8:39am
    And here is an AP report on the rap scene developing in Benghazi.
    Roughly a dozen rap songs recorded since the start of the rebellion have been put on CDs for sale in Benghazi. One cover has a drawing of fighters on a captured Gaddafi tank flying the rebel flag.

    "Muammar, get out, get out, game over! I'm a big, big soldier!" sang 20-year-old Milad Faraway, who started Music Masters with his friend and neighbour, 22-year-old Mohammed Madani, at the end of 2010.

    Rather than grabbing AK-47s and heading to the front line with other rebels to fight Gaddafi's forces, Faraway and Madani stayed in Benghazi, and picked up a microphone.

    "Everyone has his own way of fighting, and my weapon is art," said Faraway, a geology student.

    The freewheeling rap scene developing in Benghazi indicates how much has changed in eastern Libya in the past two months. Speaking out against Gaddafi before the rebellion used to mean prison and maybe even death.

    "I always wanted to talk about Gaddafi's mistakes and crimes, but we never had the chance for free speech. All you could talk about was how good Gaddafi's revolution was," said Madani.

    Many of the songs that Music Masters and other groups have recorded in the past two months feature rapid fire lyrics reminiscent of Eminem. The lyrics ridicule Gaddafi and lambast him for his treatment of the country in the past four decades.
  • 8:15am
    A number of tales recounting the bravery of protesters speaking out against the rule of Muammar Gaddafi are emerging.

    Al Jazeera's Sue Turton spoke to one man whose life was saved by a woman who joined his demonstration.
  • 7:33am
    The Libyan government says it is keeping to its commitment to stand down its troops - but will retaliate if attacked.
  • 7:14am
    A Reuters photo of the man (C) from Kazakhstan, who tried to hijack an Alitalia flight from Paris to Rome on Sunday night, demanding it be flown to Libya, is escorted by police as he leaves Fiumicino airport, northeast Rome April 25, 2011.

    Witnesses said the man put a small knife to the throat of a female flight attendant and held her for a few minutes.
    But he was quickly overpowered and arrested when the plane landed, officials and witnesses said.
    File 24511
  • 7:00am

    With both administrations claiming authority over two different areas in Libya, some are suggesting a formal partition of the country to end the conflict.

    But this idea has been rejected by those living in the opposition stronghold of Benghazi.
    Al Jazeera's Mike Hanna reports from south of there, Ajdabiya. You can watch it here.
  • 6:35am
    Libya's opposition council says it has been given $180m by Kuwait to help pay salaries.

    Leaders say they have also received weapons from "friends and allies". But they did not say which countries or organisations had donated them.

    Kuwait is the second Arab state after Qatar to officially recognise the Libyan rebel forces.
  • 6:28am
    An attempt to hijack a plane on its way to Rome has been foiled.

    Cabin crew and passengers over-powered a man on board the Air Italia plane, which had taken off from Paris.

    The man, reportedly from Kazakhstan, used a small knife in the attack and demanded the plane fly to the Libyan capital, Triploi.

    He was handed over to Italian police when the plane landed in Rome. 
  • 6:09am
    Misurata received a much needed supply of aid with the arrival of a ship chartered by the World Food Programme.

    Humanitarian supplies, including food, medical supplies and three fully working ambulances, were lifted off the WFP ship on Saturday, upon its arrival at the port of the battle-torn, opposition-held city.

    One of the ambulances was given courtesy of the Maltese government and the additional two were bought from the UK by the Libyan Non-governmental organisation called 'I-go'.
  • 4:32am
    And here are a couple of photos, courtesty of Reuters....
    File 24491File 24471


  • 3:37am
    Despite it being the wee hours in Libya, officials are taking journalists on tour of the Gaddafi compound damaged by NATO strikes a few hours ago. The AFP reports:
    A Libyan official accompanying journalists at the scene said 45 people were wounded, 15 seriously, in the bombing.
    He added that he did not know whether there were victims under the rubble.
    "It was an attempt to assassinate Colonel Gaddafi," he affirmed.
  • 3:25am
    AFP also seems to confirm that Gaddafi's compound has been hit:
    Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's office in his immense Tripoli residence was destroyed in an air strike early Monday, said a Libyan official accompanying journalists at the scene.
    We'll post images ASAP.
  • 2:57am
    Witnesses tell Reuters that a NATO airstrike has struck (actyally, they say "flattens") a building inside Muammar Gaddafi's Bab al-Aziziyah compount in Tripoli.
  • 2:17am
    Abdelati Obeidi, Libya's foreign minister is heading to Ethiopia to "discuss a peace plan with the African Union", quoth Reuters.
    Libya's government accepted a peace proposal put forward by the Addis Ababa-based AU earlier this month, but the rebels immediately rejected.
    So, there's that.
  • 1:43am
    A child draws a caricature - a decent one by any measure - of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi at a workshop in Benghazi, organised by residents for children to express their feelings about the current conflict:
    File 24411
  • 1:38am
    Reuters now reports that Libyan state TV channels are now back on the air.
  • 12:50am
    Reuters reprts that three state Libyan TV stations went off air after explosions were heard in Tripoli.
  • 12:41am
    Click on the image below to go to a slideshow by our web producer Evan Hill:
    "Martyr's Tie"
  • 12:22am
    AFP reports:
    Heavy explosions late Sunday shook the centre of Tripoli as warplanes overflew the Libyan capital.
    The blasts, the strongest to have hit the city so far, shook the hotel in which foreign correspondents here are staying not far from downtown.
    The explosions came at 2210 GMT Sunday in several districts of Tripoli, which has been the target since Friday of intensive NATO raids.

  • 12:00am
    Al Jazeera's Anita McNaught, reporting from Tatouine, Tunisia (at the Libyan border) said that the Libyan towns at the Tunisian border have been raging their own battles, but with fewer journalists there, the images of the fighting and destruction have not yet been seen.

    She said that the rebel success in opening the border crossing is a "slap" in the face of pro-Gaddafi forces.

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  • AFreedom 5 hours ago
    Freedom at last we can smell and see it coming inside our Libya! We sacrificed so much and all in the name of freedom and to be able to allow our own Libyan people to have fair democratic elections to choose our new governments!

    To the western world you might say why is so hard to have a democratic election, but to our Libyans inside our Libya, we all know we had no say to choose our so called elected members for over 40 years now!

    Nobody dared to run against our Dictator and his family! Some will say well his sons and daughter are the trouble! I ask you all to realize his entire family is the trouble! One of our Dictator Cousins was the head of our Air Force, for years just as another example on how our Dictator kept full power for over 4 decades in a row!

    If you spoke up against our Dictator the best thing that could happen to you is you will be killed! Sadly you will be taken alive and forced to watch your wife being raped by the Dictator Secret Service also known as the Green Shirts!

    I can go on about why for over 40 years we were stuck with a complete and unpopular Dictator ruling our country it's no need for that now!

    To the Belorussians (sorry Politically Correct Russian Trolls). I guess your relatives are now trying to escape from Triste on small boats after being taken apart in many cases by people from the city! But what do you expect will happen to your relatives if you raped and murdered a number of ladies inside Triste! It might be our Dictator so called strong hold, but local population will never allow you to rape our women and get away with it!
  • AFreedom 5 hours ago
    Site? Get at least the names right you Belorussian Troll! Is not Site but Sirte, but can't expect anymore much from either your trolls or your fellow Belorussian hired Mercenaries that are now running for their lives out of Sirte on small boats with 5 to 15 fighters in each boat! lol

    Is Sirte neutral now? No!

    Is Sirte facing internal fighting totally! Only 2 days ago after the rape and murder of a few local Libyan ladies by the hired Belorussian Mercenaries fighting for our Dictator the tide turned!

    Now last 24 hours I can confirm one of our Libyan Army located in Sirte, has turned it's guns against our Dictator Elite (Mercenary Armies). Who will win this internal battle is way to soon to say sadly!

    But this new battle front shows major break inside Sirte between our Libyan Army and our Dictator Mercenaries! It only means that the Dictator gets weaker and weaker!

    more -- http://blogs.aljazeera.net/live/africa/libya-live-blog-april-25


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