President Barack Obama says the United States favours the ouster of Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, but the international military effort has a more limited goal of establishing a no-fly zone over Libya and protecting civilians against massacre by forces loyal to the longtime ruler.
Moammar Gadhafi vowed to launch a final assault on the opposition's capital Benghazi and crush the rebellion as his forces advanced toward the city and warplanes bombed its airport today.
The Libyan revolution is losing the battle. Gaddafi's army does not have much logistical capability, but it can get enough fuel and ammunition east along the coast road to attack Benghazi, Libya's second city, at some point in the next week or so.
Moammar Gadhafi's forces overwhelmed rebels in a strategic eastern city, hammering them with airstrikes, missiles, tanks and artillery in an assault that sent residents fleeing and threatened to open the way for an all-out government offensive on the opposition's main stronghold in the east, Benghazi.
With fierce barrages of tank and artillery fire, Moammar Gadhafi's loyalists threw rebels into a frantic retreat from a strategic oil port in a counter-offensive that reversed the opposition's advance toward the capital of Tripoli and now threatens its positions in the east.
Government forces drove hundreds of rebels from a strategic oil port with a withering rain of rockets and tank shells on Thursday, significantly expanding Moammar Gadhafi's control of Libya as Western nations struggled to find a way to stop him.
Three British Broadcasting Corp staff were detained, beaten and subjected to mock executions by pro-regime soldiers in Libya while attempting to reach the western city of Zawiya, the broadcaster said today.
Forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi have struck an oil pipeline and oil storage facility, sending a giant yellow fireball into the sky as they pounded rebels with artillery and gunfire in at least two major cities.
Forces loyal to Moammar Gadhafi hammered rebels with rocket barrages and airstrikes om Tuesday, trying to check their advance out of the opposition-held east of Libya toward the capital Tripoli. At least 26 were wounded, some of them seriously.
President Barack Obama warned Libya's leaders that the US and its Nato allies are still considering military options in response to what he called "unacceptable" violence perpetrated by supporters of Moammar Gadhafi.
Britain is blaming a misunderstanding for a bungled mission to contact Libya's opposition that ended with eight people detained and the UK ambassador's humbling apology broadcast on Libyan state television.
Libyan helicopter gunships fired on a rebel force advancing west toward the capital along the Mediterranean coastline on Sunday and forces loyal to leader Moammar Gadhafi fought intense ground battles with the rival fighters.
Moammar Gadhafi is safe for now, holed up in the Libyan capital surrounded by his followers and militiamen.
Tensions in the Middle East have propelled oil prices to a more than two-year high and are causing more concerns for New Zealand motorists after this week's 5c-a-litre hike in fuel prices.
All New Zealanders who wanted to leave Libya have now left, Foreign Minister Murray McCully says.
Libyan border crossings are being overwhelmed by tens of thousands of hungry, fearful people fleeing its burgeoning civil war. Egypt and a handful of European nations have launched emergency airlifts and sent ships to handle the chaotic exodus.
Violence and chaos in Libya have triggered an exodus of more than 140,000 refugees to Tunisia and Egypt, a UN official said, as aid workers warned the situation at the Tunisian border has reached crisis point.
The full membership of the United Nations has suspended Libya from the UN Human Rights Council in the latest international effort to isolate Moammar Gadhafi's government for its violent attacks on civilian protesters.
International pressure on Moammar Gadhafi to end a crackdown on opponents escalated as his loyalists fought rebels holding the two cities closest to the capital and his warplanes bombed an ammunition depot in the east.
US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says the US is sending assistance teams to Libya's borders with Egypt and Tunisia. The teams will help desperate refugees trying to flee a potential civil war.
