Children Shot Amid Sniper Attack In Libya

Children are among the victims of shootings in Tripoli's only working hospital after being caught up in violence in Libya's capital.

The hospital has been swamped by casualties over the last few days.

And those numbers swelled overnight as the rebels moved into the city and Green Square centre.

A three-year-old toddler died despite treatment for a bullet wound to her stomach.

And an 11-year-old girl has a wound to the head where a sniper bullet entered.

The hospital is stretched beyond belief and it is crumbling under the pressure.

There are not enough medics and those that are there are exhausted.

There are piles of rubbish built-up in every corner after many staff stopped coming to work due to the danger.

Blood-soaked bandages are strewn on the floor and on one corner there is a still-full urine bag.

The injured are in corridors and their beds piled on top of one another.

"Please, please tell the world we need help," one doctor told me.

The hospital is in a particularly bad geographical position because it is very close to the Rixos hotel (where western journalists stay), and very close to the Gaddafi compound and Green Square.

There is the sound of constant gunfire outside the hospital and rocket-propelled grenades are constantly shelling nearby.

At least one mortar shell hit a hospital perimeter wall and there has been the sound of a loud explosion nearby.