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Libyan capital

Huge explosions shook a military site in an eastern suburb of Libya's capital early Saturday as Western forces piled pressure on Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi with a barrage of air strikes.

The blasts, on the eighth day of a Western bombing campaign to halt attacks by Gaddafi's forces on civilians, left a radar facility in flames in Tajura, home to several military bases, a witness told AFP.

"The district was shaken by three explosions in succession," the resident said, adding that the explosions had shattered windows.

"The raid targeted a military radar site which is still on fire," the resident, who lives close by, added.

US officials said the relentless pressure on Gaddafi and his allies was beginning to take its toll, and that the veteran Libyan leader was arming volunteers.

"We've received reports today that he has taken to arming what he calls volunteers to fight the opposition," said US Vice Admiral William Gortney.

Until now, Gaddafi is believed to have relied on militias run by his sons as well as African mercenaries to fight poorly-armed but determined opposition forces.

Gaddafi "has virtually no air defence left to him and a diminishing ability to command and sustain his forces on the ground", said Gortney following the UN-mandated air strikes launched on March 19 by the United States, Britain, and France.

"His air force cannot fly, his warships are staying in port, his ammunitions stores are being destroyed, communications towers are being toppled, his command bunkers rendered useless," Gortney said.

Western forces also pounded several key cities and towns overnight, including Ajdabiya, where regime loyalists have dug in and been accused by residents of brutalising the population.

Plumes of smoke filled the sky over Ajdabiya on Friday as the air strikes escalated, forcing terrified residents to flee the strategic coastal city, 160 kilometres (100 miles) south of the eastern rebel stronghold of Benghazi.

"We entered the town," Colonel Mohammed Ehsayer, who defected from the army to join the rebellion against Gaddafi, told AFP at a rebel outpost a few kilometres east of the city.

20:12 | |

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