Nato shot itself in foot: Minister

The Nato military alliance has endangered its credibility with a bomb that destroyed a house in the Libyan capital, killing several residents, Italy's foreign minister said yesterday.

It was the first time Nato had acknowledged causing multiple civilian casualties in Libya and came as the alliance feels the strain of a campaign taking more time and resources than expected.

Nato said the intended target was a missile site. The head of its Libya operations said he regretted the loss of life and that a system failure may have knocked the weapon off course.

Libya accused Nato of deliberately targeting the population and blamed the alliance for further civilian deaths in Sebha and in Surman.