BENGHAZI – Troops loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi are still in control of the oil terminal and refinery of the strategic eastern port of Brega despite rebel advances, a spokesman for rebel forces said on Friday.
The two sides have been battling for months over Brega, 750km east of Tripoli. The rebels see securing the oil facilities as a tipping point in the war and hope to resume oil exports from there as quickly as possible.
Rebels said they had captured a residential area of Brega on Thursday. But spokesman Mohammed Zawawi told reporters it was still not safe to go into the city. The oil terminal is about 15km from the residential district.
"Now we're trying to clear that area. There are some Qadhafi troops still there," said Mohammed Zawawi. "Qadhafi troops are shooting rockets into the city."
Qadhafi is clinging to power despite a near five-month-old NATO air campaign, tightening economic sanctions, and a lengthening war with rebels trying to end his 41-year rule.
The rebels have seized large swathes of the North African state, but are deeply divided and lack experience, and Thursday's gains in the east broke weeks of stalemate.
In the west, rebel forces driving north toward the town of Zawiyah, within striking distance of Qadhafi's stronghold in the capital, have not moved up from Thursday's positions.
Rebels said they had reached the village of Bir Shuaib, some 25km from Zawiyah, which has unsuccessfully risen up against Qadhafi twice this year.
THREE FRONTS
The western battle is one of three widely separated rebel fronts against Qadhafi forces. In the east around the ports of Misrata and Brega, fighting had been bogged down in recent weeks while the western rebels have advanced.
Misrata, a sea port on the Mediterranean under rebel control for months, is about 500km east of Brega
Zawiyah lies less than 50km west of Tripoli, on the main road to Tunisia, which has been a lifeline for Libya but has begun to crack down on rampant smuggling of gasoline.
Rebels in the western mountains do not operate as a single force, as each town has its own command. But when they join forces for major operations they can muster a few thousand men.
In an effort to pile economic and military pressure on Qadhafi, more countries are set to announce next week that they will free frozen assets for the rebels, a British official said.
"While it's hard to predict when this will end, it's easy to see the pressure is building on Qadhafi and it is only a matter of time before he's forced to leave power," the official said.
Britain is playing a leading role in NATO air strikes against Qadhafi's forces, which have weakened his armory but have not enabled the rebels to deliver a knockout blow.
Tightening the economic noose around Qadhafi, Tunisia said on Thursday its troops were patrolling fuel stations to curb the flow of smuggled gasoline into neighboring Libya.
International sanctions and the effects of Libya's civil war have disrupted normal supplies of fuel to parts of the country under Qadhafi's control, but huge volumes of gasoline are instead being smuggled across the Libyan-Tunisian border.
"The armed forces are now conducting checks at fuel stations in the south of Tunisia…so that neither Tunisians nor Libyans can fill up with large quantities," Tunisian defense ministry official Mokhtar Ben Nasr told a news conference.
"These checks are aimed at preventing the smuggling of diesel and gasoline to Libya."
