Anti-Gaddafi Forces Capture Sirte's Port

Libya's anti-Gaddafi fighters have captured the port of Sirte in their battle for control of Colonel Gaddafi's hometown.

The forces have been stepping-up their siege on the town, after they were forced back from the coastal town over the weekend.

On Sunday, they pushed within a few hundred metres of the Sirte's centre but drew back their attack while Nato aircrafts bombed targets in the area.

The port lies on the north side of the city but it is the city centre that Col Gaddafi's compound and military bunkers lie and National Transitional Council (NTC) fighters said they expected his remaining loyalists to put up fierce resistance.

"As we move closer to the city centre, it's going to be face-to-face street fighting and we are preparing for it," said one fighter, Ali Zaidi.

After NTC troops came under heavy fire from machine guns as well as snipers and rocket-propelled grenades at the weekend, Nato planes bombed Gaddafi positions in the town.

Nato confirmed it had targeted an ammunition storage facility, a command centre and two armed vehicles in the vicinity.

The air raids are designed to clear the way for NTC fighters to capture Sirte, some 250 miles (400km) east of the capital Tripoli.

The town is one of the last bastions of pro-Gaddafi resistance in the country, and is geographically and strategically vital, as it divides the country between east and west.

Furthermore, the NTC has said it cannot claim success until Sirte and Bani Walid, a town 105 miles (170km) south of Tripoli, are both under their control.

The renewed push on Sirte comes after a mass grave was found, reportedly containing more than 1,200 victims of Muammar Gaddafi.

The NTC said the remains are believed to be the victims of the 1996 Abu Salim prison massacre, when Gaddafi forces shot dead inmates after they protested about conditions at the facility.

Meanwhile the cost of Britain's military involvement in Libya could be as high as £1.75bn - almost seven times what the Government said it would need to spend.

Defence analyst Francis Tusa used information released in response to parliamentary questions, plus data from the RAF, to conclude that the Government has given a misleading appraisal of the costs.