TRIPOLI – At least 18 people, including a baby, were killed in the fighting in the Libyan town of Misrata on Sunday, a doctor in the embattled country said. “We have 18 martyrs but the figure is not final. We also have many people wounded, I cannot even count them,” said the doctor, who worked at Misrata main hospital, adding that the dead included rebels and civilians. Troops loyal to Muammar Gaddafi, meanwhile, launched counter-offensives against rebel-held towns, increasing fears that Libya is heading for a protracted civil war rather than the swift revolutions seen in Tunisia and Egypt. The Gaddafi government proclaimed sweeping overnight victories over what it called terrorist bands.
Loyalists poured into the streets of Tripoli at dawn, firing into the air and holding portraits of the leader who has headed the country for 41 years. But after what residents said was a day of fierce fighting with artillery, rockets and mortar bombs, rebel forces announced they had fought off Gaddafi’s forces in the towns of Zawiyah and Misrata to the immediate west and to the east of Tripoli.
“We would like to put the people of this great nation at ease…because the regime is spreading rumours,” opposition rebel council spokesman Hafiz Ghoga told a Benghazi news conference. “Both Zawya and Misrata are secured, liberated cities.” Gaddafi’s troops, backed by tanks, artillery, warplanes and helicopters also attacked positions near the oil port of Ras Lanuf. Rebels surrounded by troops near the centre of Zawiyah, another town west of Tripoli, faced another attack after repelling two assaults by tanks and infantry the day before.
