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unrest in the Libyan city of Benghazi, Al-Jazeera TV reported yesterday.
Witnesses from Benghazi said that dozens of people were killed on Saturday when troops opened fire on anti-government protesters in the city.
Al-Jazeera TV quoted medical sources as saying 61 people had been killed in the latest protests in Tripoli yesterday. Fighting has also broken out in the eastern cities of Al-Bayada, Ajdabiya, Darnah, and Tobruk. Earlier, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s son Seif al-Islam in a televised speech warned that Libya would face a civil war if the clashes continued.
Seif al-Islam said 84 protesters were killed in Benghazi, denying early reports of 250 deaths of protesters.
He vowed that the government will fight until “the last man, the last woman, and the last bullet,” to stay in power. He said that Libya is “not Egypt or Tunisia,” neighbouring countries whose leaders were swept from power in recent weeks.
Promising “incredible reforms for a new Libya”, he urged protesters to go home.
Inspired by popular protests that had swept Tunisia and Egypt and forced their leaders to step down, thousands of Libyans have started a string of protests against their leader Muammar Gaddafi.
Anti-government protests reached the capital for the first time yesterday, leaving dozens dead at the hands of the security forces. Several cities in the east appeared to be in the hands of the opposition as protests spread from Benghazi, cradle of a popular uprising that has rattled one of the Arab world’s most entrenched governments.
Anti-government protests have also broken out in the central town of Ras Lanuf, the site of an oil refinery and petrochemical complex, Libya’s Quryna newspaper reported on its Internet site yesterday. Protesters rallied in Tripoli’s streets, tribal and religious leaders spoke out against Gaddafi, and army units defected to the opposition in a revolt that has cost the lives of more than 200 people.
Protesters said they had taken control of Benghazi and other cities, with some analysts suggesting the country was heading for civil war. Output at one of the country’s oil fields was reported to have been stopped by a workers’ strike and some European oil companies withdrew expatriate workers and suspended operations. Most of the country’s oil fields are in the east, south of Benghazi.
In signs of disagreement inside Libya’s ruling elite, Justice Minister Mustapha Abdel Jalil resigned in protest at the “excessive use of violence” against protesters. Libyan permanent representative to the Arab League resigned on Sunday and joined the protests in his country, Egypt’s state-run MENA agency reported.
The Libyan permanent representative, Ambassador Abdel Moniem el-Honey, announced his resignation from all his posts in the Cairo-based pan-Arab organisation and joined the “public protest”. – Xinhua/Reuters.