Libyan rebels fly flag in Zawiya and claim key strategic success

Libyan rebels have fought their way into the strategic city of Zawiya west of Tripoli in their most significant advance in months, battling snipers on rooftops and heavy shelling from Muammar Gaddafi’s forces holding the city.

Zawiya, 30 miles from the capital, is a key target for rebels waging a new offensive launched from the mountains in the far west of Libya, an attempt to break the deadlock in combat between the two sides that has held for months in the centre and east of the country.

A credible threat from the rebels in the west could strain Col Gaddafi’s troops, which have been hammered for months by Nato airstrikes.

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Defending Zawiya is key for the regime but could require bringing in better trained forces who are currently ensuring its hold over its Tripoli stronghold or fighting rebels on fronts further east.

A group of about 200 exuberant rebel fighters, advancing from the south, reached a bridge on Zawiya’s south-western outskirts and some rebels pushed further into the city’s central main square.

They tore down the green flag of Col Gaddafi’s regime from a mosque minaret and put up two rebel flags. A reporter travelling with the rebels saw hundreds of residents rush into the streets, greeting the fighters piled into the backs of pickup trucks with chants of “God is great”.

Col Gaddafi’s forces then counterattacked with a barrage of heavy weapons, and the loud crackle of gunfire could be heard as rebels and government troops battled.

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Regime snipers were firing on the rebels from rooftops, said one resident, Abdel-Basset Abu Riyak.

He said Col Gaddafi’s forces were holed up in several pockets in the city and that there were reports of reinforcements coming from Tripoli, though there was no sign of them yet.

Rebel spokesman Jumma Ibrahim claimed that the opposition’s fighters controlled most of Zawiya by nightfall on Saturday.

“What remains are few pockets (of Gaddafi forces) in the city,” he said. “The road is now open all the way from the western mountains to Zawiya, we can send them supply and reinforcement anytime.”

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Perhaps more importantly, the rebels now control the main road linking Tripoli to the Tunisian border, according to Fadlallah Haroun, the head of the rebels’ security council in Benghazi. The road passes through Zawiya.

Zawiya’s residents rose up and threw off regime control when Libya’s anti-Gaddafi revolt first began in February.

But Col Gaddafi’s forces retaliated and crushed opposition in the city in a long and bloody siege in March.

Many of Zawiya’s rebels fled into the mountains and were among the lead forces advancing on the city while others like Abu Riyak remained in the city, lying low.

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Mr Abu Riyak said residents were now joining up with the rebels’ assault, saying, “95 per cent of Zawiya’s people are with the revolution”.

One rebel, 23-year-old Ibrahim Akram, said: “There is shooting from all sides. The people joined us. Fierce clashes are still ongoing but thank God our numbers are great.”

But Col Gaddafi is likely to fight hard to hold control of Zawiya. The city of about 200,000 people on the Mediterranean coast is key because as well as controlling the route to Tunisia it is the site of the sole remaining oil refineries in the western region still under the regime’s control.

The best armed and equipped units have been involved in fighting at the main fronts – around the city of Misrata, east of Tripoli, and at the oil port of Brega.

Government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim dismissed reports of rebel advance on Zawiya as the act of “remnants of armed gangs”.