'NATO air strike' kills Libyan rebels

A North Atlantic Treaty Organisation air attack on Thursday killed at least 13 rebels and wounded several others near Brega, after they were mistaken for Muammar Gaddafi's forces which was engaged in fierce fighting for the control of the eastern oil hub.

The attack came as rebels were moving tanks, armoured vehicles and rocket launchers near the frontline between the towns of Brega and Ajdabiya, the gateway to the rebel stronghold of Benghazi in the east.

At least 13 rebels fighters were killed in the NATO strike, BBC reported. There was no immediate comment from NATO. This was the second time in a week that the rebels have blamed NATO for bombing them by mistake. Chaotic scenes were witnessed as ambulances rushed to the target site to move blood-dripping victims to the nearest hospital in Ajdabiya, 80-km from Brega.

NATO has been caught in a catch-22 situation. On the one hand, Gaddafi's forces used human shields to prevent NATO targetting them. On the other, NATO is finding it difficult to differentiate between Gaddafi's troops and rebels using government tanks and armoury.

Amid the see-saw battle along the Mediterranean coast between the rebels and government forces, opposition fighters have regained ground in Brega. Gaddafi's forces had pushed back the rebels from Brega on Tuesday.

"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, was quoted as saying by the Al Jazeera channel.

He said, "Our forces are at the eastern border of the city, the Gaddaf 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 "but we hope our resolve and most of all the resolve of NATO will prevent them to do that." Media reports said civilians were fleeing Ajdabiya in large numbers amid rumours that Gaddafi's troops were preparing to attack the city.

Gaddafi's forces were on Thursday blamed for attacking huge oil fields in Libya's east shutting down production in an attempt to block finances of rebels. Rebel spokesmen in Benghazi said, the Sarir oil-fields, the largest in Libya with a reserve of 12 billion barrels of oil and the nearby Misala field had been attacked and extensively damaged by tanks and heavy artillery of government forces.

The attacks on the oil fields was the first since the breakout of uprising against 42 year rule of Libyan rule and Tripoli immediately countered by blaming British war planes of carrying out air strikes on oil facilities, which killed three guards and left scores of oil workers injured.

The Libyan deputy foreign minister, Khalid Kaim told reporters in Tripoli that the strike had damaged a pipeline connecting the two oil fields to Marsa el Hariga port. He described the attacks as against international law and not covered by the United Nations resolution. The damage to the oil fields came as the rebels made their first oil sales to the West, with a Liberian registered tanker Equator, sailing from the port of Tobruk.

Gheriani said Gaddafi's artillery hit the oil wells on Tuesday and Wednesday shutting down production. The rebel spokesmen said groups of armoured vehicles attacked the oil field of Messla and of Sarir earlier this week, the Al-Jazeera reported.

Gaddafi's forces used heavy fire power to pound the western city of Misruta, which they have completely cut off by land route. Rebels were preparing to supply their fighters and people in the besieged city by sea, under NATO naval escort.

Gaddafi's letter to Obama

With his forces, blunting all rebel attacks, Gaddafi in a letter to United States President Barack Obama asked him to stop air strikes on his country.

Calling the strikes on Libya "as an unjust war" Gaddafi said, "You (Obama) are a man who has enough courage to annul a wrong and mistaken action."

Though the Libyan officials in Tripoli did not divulge the contents of the letter and in excerpts widely published in the US media, Gaddafi addressed Obama as "son". White House confirmed the letter but top officials shrugged it off.

Gadaffi said in the letter that, "democracy and building of civil society cannot be achieved by means of missiles and aircrafts or by backing armed members of the Al-Qaeda in Benghazi."