No halt to Libya violence; pressure cranked up on Gaddafi

Benghazi: Forces loyal to Libyan leader Muammer Gaddafi opened fire on protesters in several areas of the capital Tripoli on Friday, and at least two people were killed, witnesses told AFP by telephone.

"The security forces fired indiscriminately on the demonstrators," said a resident of one of the eastern suburbs that has seen previous clashes between opponents of the regime and its remaining loyalists.

"There were deaths in the streets of Sug al-Jomaa," the resident said.

Residents of other eastern suburbs, including Ben Ashur and Fashlum, as well as the western district of Ghut Ashaal, said they too had witnessed sustained gunfire against anyone in the streets.

"They shot at unarmed civilians who were leaving after prayers," a Ben Ashur resident said.

Security personnel had deployed around mosques to prevent demonstrations after the main weekly Muslim prayers, witnesses said.

In their sermons, prayer leaders followed a text that had been imposed by the authorities calling for a "return to stability" and an end to "sedition" and "acts of sabotage," worshippers said.

UN rights boss demands halt to Libya crimes

Tripoli/Geneva: The United Nations human rights chief on Friday denounced mass killings by Libyan forces using tanks and helicopters and called on the international community to stop the bloodshed.

In pictures: Anti-government unrest spreads in Libya

Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said thousands of people may have been killed or injured in the mounting violence against anti-government protesters, many by shots to the head or chest.

She was addressing an emergency session of the UN Human Rights Council convened in Geneva to examine the grave situation in the North African country, whose leader Muammar Gaddafi is clinging to power.

"In brazen and continuing breach of international law, the crackdown in Libya on peaceful demonstrations is escalating alarmingly with reported mass killings, arbitrary arrests, detention and torture of protesters," Pillay told the forum.

"Tanks, helicopters and military aircraft have reportedly been used indiscriminately to attack the protesters," she said.

Western powers including the United States and France are pushing to have Libya's membership of the 47-member state forum put under challenge at the special session.

No Libyan delegation was present at the talks.

Meanwhile, Nato's chief called an emergency alliance meeting on Libya on Friday and offered to help Europe bring home thousands of citizens stranded in the strife-torn country.

As the European Union prepared sanctions against the regime of Moamer Kadhafi, Nato Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen met with EU defence ministers in Hungary to discuss the vast evacuation effort under way in Libya.

Rasmussen also convened a separate emergency meeting of the North Atlantic Council, the 28-nation alliance's decision-making body, for later in the day in Brussels.

Two top Libyan judicial figures quit

Top judicial figures have announced their resignations as members in the Libyan regime. They said they were taking the side of revolutionists who are now ruling 95 per cent of the country.

General Public Prosecutor and Consultant Judge Abdul Rahman Al Abbar and Head of Judicial Inspection Ebrahim Bu Shanaf said they consider themselves as members in the revolution from February 18 - the day they discovered that Gaddafi’s mercenaries were responsible for killing peaceful protesters in Benghazi.

In a 1.35-minute youtube footage, Bu Shanaf read out his resignation from the court book. He said he became a member of the revolution a week ago when forces of Gaddafi attacked protesters in front of its North Benghazi Court House.

Bu Shanaf called on judges and public prosecutors in the country to document whatever that could help in filing criminal cases against those who caused the crisis.

He said he was waiting to see the liberation of the capital, Tripoli, to initiate a country-wide investigation into the crimes committed by the regime.

In his resignation footage, Bu Shanaf read verses from the Quran and congratulated mothers and families of martyrs, 'whose sacrifices will lead to Libya enjoying liberty from 42 years of Gaddafi rule'.

UN Security Council to meet on Libya

The UN Security Council will meet in formal session on Friday to discuss the Libya crisis and Muammar Gaddafi's refusal to halt his crackdown on democracy protests, diplomats said.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon will address the 15 nation council which has been searching for ways to step up pressure on Gaddafi over the unrest in which hundreds have been killed.

Meanwhile, the Telegraph newspaper reported Friday that Britain will shortly seize billions of pounds in assets that Gaddafi has stored in the European country. Britain's finance department has set up a unit to trace Gaddafi's British assets which it believes include bank accounts, commercial property and a 10 million pound (16.1 million dollar, 11.6 million euro) London home, the paper said.

"The first priority is to get British nationals out of Libya," a government source told the British daily. "But then we are ready to move in on Gaddafi's assets, the work is under way. This is definitely on the radar at the highest levels."

Zawiya holds strong against attack

Zawiya's citizens defeated the second wave of attack by the mercenaries of Gaddafi who reached the city at around 11 PM local time.

Eyewitnesses from the city said around 200 Africans reached the city from the nearby Surman 15-km to the south-west of Zawiya.

A source from the city said Zawiya's citizens had defeated the attackers. “Groups of defenders were stationed on different accesses of the city and managed to handle the attack successfully.

The revolutionists and the attackers exchanged fire, but no casualties were recorded in the city. Medical services in the city suffer from lack of blood units and other necessities for handling big number of injuries. At least 17 were killed and 95 injured in the afternoon attack.

Gaddafi 'cornered'

A very nervous Muammar Gaddafi is entrenched in the Azizeh camp in Tripoli, Mustafa Abdul Jalil, Libya's former justice minister and head of the revolutionary council in the eastern city of Baida told Gulf News.

"Gaddafi is controlling less that 5 per cent of the country," Jalil said, warning that "Gaddafi will not leave until he kills every Libyan".

He urged the US and the European Union to protect the Libyan people from what observers have called a "massacre".

Shaikh Khalifa orders aid

The UAE has reached out to help Libyans. President His Highness Shaikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Thursday ordered the Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Foundation to provide urgent humanitarian aid to people in Libya affected by the violence in the country.

Frightened foreigners flee Libya 'hell'

Foreigners Friday faced hellish scenes in Tripoli as countries worldwide sent planes and warships in a desperate bid to rescue their nationals from the chaos engulfing Libya.

Thousands of foreigners packed into the terminal to try to escape the widening crisis; nearly 20,000 people have also fled Libya by road to Tunisia over the past four days.

"Libya is descending into hell," said Helena Sheehan, who made it to London Gatwick Airport on the first specially-chartered British rescue flight. "The airport is like nothing I've ever seen in my whole life," the 66-year-old said. "It's absolute chaos. There's just thousands and thousands of people trying to get out."

A US-chartered ferry carrying 285 evacuees remained stuck in the port of Tripoli, the State Department said.

Italy, the nearest major European country and Libya's biggest trading partner, warned of a looming "catastrophic humanitarian crisis" as up to 1.5 million migrants flee north Africa.

The logistical challenges were especially acute for Asian countries with more than 150,000 low-paid workers trapped - including some 60,000 Bangladeshis and 30,000 Filipinos. China ramped up a massive air, sea and land operation to evacuate more than 30,000 of its citizens, with over 4,000 transferred to the nearby Greek island of Crete on Thursday. Migrante International, a support group for Philippines workers abroad, said Filipinos had been left to fend for themselves, as Vice President Jejomar Binay planned to fly to the region to review emergency plans.

Around 200 Greeks were evacuated on board C-130 troop transport planes, the foreign ministry said. A Spanish military plane returned to Madrid from Tripoli early Friday carrying 40 Spaniards and 84 people of other nationalities including British, Finnish, Mexican, Canadian, Ukrainian and Portuguese, Spanish media reported.

Egyptians fleeing from Libya described how they had been beaten and tortured after Kadhafi's son accused Egyptians of being behind the uprising.

With inputs from agencies