TRIPOLI (Reuters) – NATO planes pounded Libyan government targets yesterday but stalemate in the rebel war to unseat Muammar Gaddafi has presented Western powers with a dilemma over whether to offer covert aid to the cause.
Rebels said NATO bombed government weapons depots four times during the day around 30 km (20 miles) southeast of Zintan, a town in the Western Mountains region where conflict is escalating.
“The site has some 72 underground hangars made of reinforced concrete. We don’t know how many were destroyed. But each time the aircraft struck we heard multiple explosions,” a rebel spokesman who gave his name as Abdulrahman said by telephone.
Another rebel spokesman said the planes also struck around Tamina and Chantine, east of Misrata, where besieged rebels are clinging on in the last city they control in western Libya.
A ferocious assault from Tripoli has left hundreds dead during weeks of fighting.
In Tripoli, a single explosion from an air strike was heard in late evening.
Opposition newspaper Brnieq said Libyan rebels were leading an uprising in the suburbs of Tripoli after being supplied with light weapons by defecting security service officers.
The report on the newspaper’s website could not be independently verified. A Reuters reporter said he could not hear any gunfire and a government official denied the report.
“It’s peaceful out there,” he said.
Two months into a conflict linked to this year’s uprisings in other Arab countries, rebels hold Benghazi and towns in the east while the government controls the capital and other cities.
The government says most Libyans support Gaddafi, the rebels are armed criminals and al Qaeda militants, and NATO’s intervention is an act of colonial aggression by Western powers intent on stealing the country’s oil.
Libyan state television reinforced that view, saying NATO warships bombed “military and civilian targets” in Misrata and in the adjacent town of Zlitan yesterday.
The military deadlock confronts allies including the United States, Britain and France with a choice over whether to exploit loopholes in the sanctions regime they engineered in February and March to help the rebels, analysts and UN diplomats said.
Another option would be to circumvent the sanctions secretly but both courses risk angering Russia and China who wield vetoes on the Security Council and are increasingly critical of NATO’s operations under a resolution aimed at protecting civilians.
