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In This Issue
Libyan Leader Must End Killings
Libyan forces fire tear gas in Tripoli protests
Libyan Protests Move Closer to Tripoli
Protesters Die as Crackdown in Libya Intensifies
Libyans Say Gaddafi Uses Mercenaries to Crush Uprising
Libyan snipers fire on funeral crowds:...15 mourners killed as 'Arab Spring' unrest gathers pace
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Libyan Leader Must End Killings

Ghaddafi

Colonel Gaddafi has been the leader of Libya since 1969

 

Amnesty International today called on Libyan leader Mu'ammar Gaddafi to immediately rein in his security forces amid reports of machine guns and other weapons being used against protestors and a spiralling death toll in Benghazi, Misratah and other cities. 


"Forces loyal to Colonel Gaddafi are using unwarranted lethal force against protestors calling for change and the result is a wholly predictable one," said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International's director for the Middle East and North Africa. "Large numbers of people are being killed and the situation is escalating alarmingly. More than one hundred have been killed so far"


Amnesty International"It looks like Libya's leader may have ordered his forces to put down the protests virtually at any cost, and that cost is being paid in the lives of Libyans."

"The latest reports speak of Libyans in Benghazi being shot down with machine guns and other weapons by tough new troops, including possibly foreign mercenaries, who have been ferried in to suppress the protests," said Malcolm Smart.


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Libyan forces fire tear gas in Tripoli protests  



By BBC


Ghaddafi between Ali Saleh and Mubarak

At least four separate anti-government protests have broken out in the Libyan capital for the first time, witnesses say.

 

Security forces have used live ammunition and tear gas in response, eyewitnesses in Tripoli say.

 

Libya has been hit by days of unrest, mostly focused on the east of the country, where opposition to Col Gaddafi's rule is strongest.

 

Reports from the city of Benghazi say more than 200 people have died.

 

The spreading of unrest of Tripoli would be seen as a significant blow to Col Gaddafi's attempt to contain the protests to the east.

 

The brutal suppression of protests in Benghazi has been condemned by the US, UK and other Western nations.

  
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Middle East crisis

Libyan Protests Move Closer to Tripoli   



By Richard Spencer, and Nabila Ramdani | The Telegraph

Protests in Benghazi
Protests in Benghazi

 

Hundreds of people died over the weekend as forces loyal to Col Gaddafi, who has ruled Libya for 42 years, used high-velocity sniper rifles, machine guns and even anti-aircraft artillery to fire on protesters.

 

Estimates of the number of dead vary widely from 173 by Human Rights Watch, to more than 300.

 

"Benghazi is a war zone - the situation is very tense," said a highly placed source in Tripoli. "Troops including mercenaries are being sent there by plane. The fighting is intensifying.

 

"Lots of people are being killed, including members of the security forces. The figures are certainly above 200, with many thousands more injured across the country."

 

"Tanks and helicopter gunships full of foreign mercenaries are fighting gangs of demonstrators," he said. "At least one dead man had been hit by an anti-aircraft missile, while other bodies are riddled with heavy machine gunfire."

 

One Libyan journalist claimed that a group of women and children jumped to their deaths from a bridge in Benghazi to escape the "mercenaries".

 

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Protesters Die as Crackdown in Libya Intensifies

 

 

 

By DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and MONA EL-NAGGAR | The New York Times 

 

 

Map of LibyaLibyan security forces again fired on a funeral procession through the city of Benghazi on Sunday, as residents buried dozens of dead from a crackdown the day before and as a five-day-old uprising against the dictatorship of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi appeared to spread to other cities along the Mediterranean coast.   

 

The number of confirmed deaths around the country rose to at least 173, according to a running tally by the independent group Human Rights Watch. But several people in Benghazi hospitals, reached by telephone, said they believed as many as 200 had been killed and more than 800 wounded there on Saturday alone. Witnesses indicated that many had been killed by machine-gun fire.

 

But the escalating violence in Libya - a cycle of funerals, confrontations, and more coffins - has made the revolt there the bloodiest in a wave of uprisings sweeping the region since the ouster of strongmen in Tunisia last month and Egypt last week.

 

Under Mr. Qaddafi's four decades of idiosyncratic rule, Libya has become a singular quasi-nation, where the official rhetoric disdains the idea of a nation-state, tribal bonds remain primary even within the ranks of the military, and both protesters and the security forces have reason to believe that backing down will likely mean their ultimate death or imprisonment.

 

Across the wider region, the sparks struck by successful revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt continued to burn. 

 

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Libyans Say Gaddafi Uses Mercenaries to Crush Uprising



 

View Videos of the Libyan uprising here  

 

Publisher: Al Jazeera

Publication Date: February 20, 2011

Publisher Website: http://english.aljazeera.net/

 

Videos of the Uprising in Libya 


View Videos 

Libyan snipers fire on funeral crowds: 

15 mourners killed as 'Arab Spring' unrest gathers pace   




by Daniel Boffey |
Daily Mail

 

A Libyan boy shot dead
A Libyan boy shot dead by snipers

 

Sniper commandos yesterday shot dead at least 15 mourners attending the funeral of protesters killed during the Libyan uprising as Colonel Gaddafi's regime attempted to crush dissent.

Scores more were seriously wounded, and one hospital official said a body appeared to have been hit by an anti-aircraft missile, as violence continued in the eastern city of Benghazi.  

Earlier, special forces attacked hundreds of protesters, including lawyers and judges, camped out in front of a courthouse.


A cleric said he witnessed two people in a car being crushed by a tank, bringing the death toll to at least 84.

A resident, who did not want to be named, said: 'Dozens were killed - not 15, dozens. We are in the midst of a massacre here.'


The Libyan regime's brutality yesterday led Foreign Secretary William Hague to describe the scenes as 'unacceptable and horrifying'.

Colonel Gaddafi is facing the biggest popular uprising of his 41-year autocratic reign, with the country's impoverished east the focus of the dissent.

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