Protests against Col Muammar Gadafy’s rule, inspired by uprisings in neighbouring Tunisia and Egypt, are estimated to have left 84 people dead, according to Human Rights Watch.
Security forces in Libya's second city, Benghazi, fired in the air today to disperse a crowd mourning protesters killed in the worst unrest of Col Muammar Gadafy’s four decades in power, a resident said.
Human Rights Watch said 35 people were killed in the city late last night, in the worst night of violence since protests started this week to try to emulate uprisings in neighbouring Egypt and Tunisia.
Mirroring the pattern of violence on previous days in the city, a large crowd got into a confrontation with security forces after a funeral procession to bury people killed in the crackdown, a resident said.
"They tried to attack the security forces but when they heard shots fired in the air they ran away," said the man, who did not want to be identified.
The New York-based watchdog said its tally for the number of dead was now 84 after three days of violence centred on the restive region around Benghazi, 1,000 km east of the capital Tripoli.
Benghazi cleric Abellah al-Warfali told the Qatar-based Al Jazeera television that he had a list of 16 people being buried today, most with bullet wounds to the head and chest.
"I saw with my own eyes a tank crushing two people in a car," he said. "They hadn't done any harm to anyone."
The private Quryna newspaper, which is based in Benghazi and has been linked to one of Col Gadafy's sons, said 24 people were killed in Benghazi yesterday.
It said security forces had opened fire to stop protesters attacking the police headquarters and a military base where weapons were stored.
"The guards were forced to use bullets," the paper said. The government has not released any casualty figures or made any official comment on the violence.
In London, British foreign secretary William Hague said he had reports that heavy weapons fire and sniper units were being used against demonstrators. "This is clearly unacceptable and horrifying," he said in a statement.
Away from the eastern region, Libya appeared calm. A government-run newspaper blamed the protests on Zionism and the "traitors of the West", while officials said foreign media were exaggerating the scale of the violence in the east.
A Benghazi resident, who lives near the city centre, said shooting could be heard on Friday night and that protesters had attacked and damaged the state-run radio station near his home.
"I heard shooting last night until midnight," the resident said. "The radio station has been attacked ... We do not know what we are going to do."
A security source said clashes were still going on in the region between Benghazi and the town of Al Bayda, about 200 km away, where local people said dozens had also been killed by security forces in the past 72 hours.
Reuters