Nato ups strikes on Sirte

Nato jetfighters have intensified strikes in Sirte, the hometown of the fugitive Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, says the alliance.

In a daily briefing, Nato said its strikes targeted several military facilities in Sirte, as rebels are awaiting the result of negotiations to enter the city without fighting.

Nato said Tuesday it had carried out 120 sorties, including 42 strikes, over Sirte the previous day.

They targeted three command and control facilities, four radars, one surface-to-air missile system and 22 armoured vehicles.

The rebels are negotiating with Sirte’s tribal chieftains for its peaceful surrender.

Sirte is located on the Mediterranean coast between the capital Tripoli and the eastern city of Benghazi.

Meanwhile, a rebel army commander confirmed reports that Khamis, the youngest son of Gaddafi, was killed in fighting near Tripoli.

“I have got confirmed information that Khamis was seriously injured in clashes and was taken to hospital where he died,” al-Mahdi al-Haraki, the commander of a rebel battalion in Tripoli, told broadcaster Al Arabiya.

He added that Khamis had been buried near the town of Tarhuna, 80km south of Tripoli. Al-Haraki did not say when the clashes occurred.

Earlier Tuesday, the BBC, quoting the opposition justice minister, Mohamed al-Alagy, reported that Khamis and Abdullah Senoussi, the chief of the intelligence service in the Gaddafi government, were killed on Saturday in a battle with rebels near Tarhuna.

“One of the revolutionary commanders told me he (Khamis) had been buried,” the report quoted al-Alagy as saying.

Khamis, 28, was the commander of a brigade in the pro-Gaddafi forces.