Gaddafi loyalists resist protests

Oea newspaper, which is close to Gaddafi’s son Seif al-Islam, said they were lynched after being captured in the eastern city of Al-Baida.

Security forces were deployed around Al-Baida on Friday, a source close to the authorities said, following Internet reports that protesters had seized control of the city.

“Security forces were deployed heavily around the city and control all roads in and out, as well as the airport,” the source said, declining to be named.

Demonstrators also set fire to the headquarters of a local radio station in Benghazi after the building’s guards withdrew witnesses and a security source said.

Earlier, the Revolutionary Committees, which are the backbone of Gaddafi’s regime, issued a stark warning.

“The response of the people and the Revolutionary Forces to any adventure by these small groups will be sharp and violent,” the Revolutionary Committees said on the website of their newspaper, Azzahf Al-Akhdar (Green March).

“The power of the people, the Jamahiriya (government by the masses), the Revolution and the leader are all red lines, and anyone who tries to cross or approach them will be committing suicide and playing with fire.”

Several thousand mourners on Friday went straight from weekly prayers to funerals for the Benghazi dead, witnesses said.

In another sign of growing disorder, about 1,000 inmates broke out of a prison in Benghazi, Quryna newspaper reported on its website, and four convicts were killed by security forces when they tried to flee another prison outside Tripoli, a security services source said.

The overall reported toll does not include the four prisoners.

Gaddafi, 68, is the longest-serving leader in the Arab world, but his oil-producing North African nation is sandwiched between Tunisia and Egypt, whose long-time leaders have been toppled by popular uprisings.

Computer users in Tripoli reported that from early Friday evening it was impossible to access the popular Facebook site, and connections to other Internet sites were either very slow or not possible.

Opponents of his regime had used Facebook to call for a national “day of anger” and Gaddafi sought to counter its impact with his own pro-regime rally in the heart of the capital Tripoli.

“The United States condemns the use of violence by governments against peaceful protesters in those countries and wherever it may occur,” he said in a statement.

Britain, France and the European Union have called for restraint by the authorities in Libya.

Britain’s foreign office warned nationals against all but essential travel to parts of eastern Libya including the cities of Benghazi, Al-Baida, Derna, Ajdabiya, Al-Marj and Tobruk, all in the east of the North African state.