UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay called today for an international investigation into Libya's attacks on anti-government protestors, saying they may amount to crimes against humanity.
In a statement, Ms Pillay called for the immediate halt to human rights violations and denounced the reported use of machineguns, snipers and military planes against civilians.
"Widespread and systematic attacks against the civilian population may amount to crimes against humanity," said Ms Pillay, a former UN warcrimes judge.
"The callousness with which Libyan authorities and their hired guns are reportedly shooting live rounds of ammunition at peaceful protestors is unconscionable. I am extremely worried that lives are being lost even as I speak," she said.
Meanwhile, The Arab League has suspended the Libyan delegation's participation in the Cairo-based body, Al Arabiya television said this evening.
It gave no further details about the reported move.
Separately, independent UN human rights investigators issued a joint statement condemning violations in Libya, including the use of live ammunition to crush dissent, arrests of lawyers, activists and journalists, and the cutting off of phone lines and the internet.
"By engaging in a massacre of its own people, the government of Libya is guilty of committing gross violations of human rights which could amount to crimes against humanity," said Christof Heyns, UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions.
Juan Mendez, UN special rapporteur on torture, denounced the "heavy-handed, illegitimate" use of force against protestors and said Libyan authorities must realise perpetrators could be prosecuted under international criminal justice.
Reuters