Kadhafi troops fire on Tripoli marchers, reports say

Thousands of protesters were on the streets of Tripoli, Friday, braving gunfire which is reported to have killed several people. One Tripoli resident told a Reuters correspondent in Benghazi that snipers in the Libyan capital were killing people.

Reuters

At least five people are reported to have been killed in Tripoli but unconfirmed reports say that demonstrations against Moamer Kadhafi’s rule have taken place in the east of the city.

Tweets by Kadhafi opponents put the turnout in Tripoli at tens of thousands.

Security forces are said to have fired indiscriminately on worshippers leaving Friday prayers to try and prevent demonstrations like those which have led to much of the east of the country slipping out of government control.

Clashes with protesters marching on the capital from the east were also reported.

About 3,600 European Union citizens were still awaiting evacuation Friday.

Many immigrant workers from poorer countries are also stranded, with sub-Saharan Africans subject to suspicion of being mercenaries paid by Kadhafi.

"The situation is very, very serious here,” said Anne (a pseudonym for security reasons), who works with an organisation helping refugees and immigrants in Tripoli. “All the refugees and immigrants can’t leave their houses for food. No help arrives for them".

“All the European and other countries provide something for their citizens, but the immigrants, the thousands and thousands of immigrants who are staying here – sub-Saharan Africans, Ethiopians, Eritreans – are all left here with no help".

Residents of Misrata, 150 kilometres east of the capital, were expected to turn out in force for the funerals of 30 people killed as they tried to drive out Kadhafi loyalists.

Kadhafi’s couisin and close aide Kadhaf al-Dam joined defectors Friday, according to Egyptian state media, while the Libyan envoy to the UN in Geneva told the Human Rights Council that he and others at the embassy "represent only the Libyan people" and not the regime.

Kadhafi opponents occupied the Libyan embassy in Paris Friday but ended their protest when the ambassador resigned, along with the Unesco representative.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, on a visit to Turkey Friday, declared that Kadhafi must go.

France and its partners are examining the possibility of a military intervention with “enormous prudence”, he said.