Rebel Forces Move In On Final Strongholds

Anti-Gaddafi forces are attempting renewed assaults on Loyalist strongholds in Sirte and Bani Walid as David Cameron visits "free Libya".

According to reports on Friday morning, gunfire and explosions have been heard around Bani Walid, situated 110 miles south of Tripoli, as fighters continue their final push.

The news comes as the Prime Minister and President Sarkozy visited the North African state accompanied by Foreign Secretary William Hague.

In an address to a crowd in Liberty Square in the city of Benghazi, Mr Cameron said:

“It’s great to be…in a free Benghazi and a free Libya. Your city was an inspiration to the world. While we are proud of the role that we played to help, we know this was your revolution from your bravery.

"Now, just as your courage has written the last chapter of Libyan history, so it must write the next one; and your friends in Britain and in France will stand with you as you build your democracy and build your country for the future.”

However, Mr Cameron's comments have been met with some criticism as a number of political pundits claim the British, French and US Government's intervention was opportunist.

Writing in The New Statesman this week, influential investigative journalist John Pilger said that six months after securing the UN resolution "authorising 'the [protection] of civilians and civilian-populated areas under the threat of attack', Nato is raining fragmentation bombs on civilian-populated Sirte".

"That it is a coup by a gang of Muammar al-Gaddafi's ex-cronies and spooks in collusion with Nato is hardly news. Their self-appointed leader, Mustafa Abdel Jalil, was Gaddafi's feared justice minister," Pilger wrote.

Mustafa Abdel Jalil, who is currently the leader of the Nato supported National Transistional Council, which is now in control in Libya, had worked as Minister of Justice for Gadaffi for four years until the country's insurrection began in January.

Another article in the left-leaning publication, written by its chief editor Mehdi Hasan said Chancellor George Osborne had promised that the cost of military action would be in the order of tens of millions of pounds, not hundreds of millions, "the MoD now says it has spent £200m."

Trucks and tanks are still approaching Sirte, while Colonel Gadaffi still eludes capture.

(DW/GK)