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Libya unrest: Rebels fight off Gaddafi attack

02 March 2011 19:02 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. Rebel forces have fought off an attempt by soldiers loyal to Col Muammar Gaddafi to retake the eastern oil town of Brega, APA reports quoting BBC.
Gaddafi forces had moved into eastern areas for the first time since towns there fell to protesters two weeks ago.
The BBC’s John Simpson in Brega says it seems clear of loyalist troops.
Earlier Col Gaddafi said on TV he would "fight until the last man and woman" and warned that thousands of Libyans would die if Western forces intervened.
Our correspondent has been to the seashore and the university, where the heaviest fighting took place, and they appear entirely clear of Gaddafi troops.
He says a senior rebel officer had suggested the Gaddafi troops might have run out of ammunition and been forced to withdraw.
The excited rebels appeared very proud of what they had achieved, our correspondent says, and the feeling in the town is that Col Gaddafi’s men do not necessarily have their hearts in the job.
Firing could still be heard but our correspondent was assured it was just victory shots.
A Libyan air force plane did recently drop one bomb nearby, he says, but the attempt by Col Gaddafi to move on the eastern rebel-held areas appears for now to have been repulsed.
The government forces had taken an oil facility at Brega at dawn but rebels later said they had struck back.
Spokesman Mustafa Gheriani told Reuters news agency the town was "back in the hands of the revolutionaries". He accused Col Gaddafi of "trying to create all kinds of psychological warfare to keep these cities on edge".
Medical sources in Brega told BBC Arabic that 14 people had been killed in the fighting.