France and Britain have called on Nato to step up bombing of Col Muammar Gadafy's heavy weapons to protect civilians.
The two countries first launched air attacks on Libya in coalition with the United States, but Nato took over air operations at the end of March. Heavy government bombardment of the besieged western city of Misrata has continued unabated with hundreds of civilians reported killed.
The criticism by London and Paris followed renewed shelling of Misrata yesterday and the collapse of an African Union peace initiative.
Echoing rebel complaints, French foreign minister Alain Juppe told France Info radio, "It's not enough." He said Nato must stop Col Gadafy shelling civilians and take out heavy weapons bombarding Misrata.
British foreign secretary William Hague also said Nato must intensify attacks, calling on other alliance countries to match London's supply of extra ground attack aircraft in Libya.
Nato, which stepped up air strikes around Misrata and the eastern battlefront city of Ajdabiyah at the weekend under a UN mandate to protect civilians, rejected the criticism.
"Nato is conducting its military operations in Libya with vigour within the current mandate. The pace of the operations is determined by the need to protect the population," it said.
The European Union today agreed to extend sanctions against Libya, imposing an asset freeze on 26 companies and two people in its effort to force Libyan leader Col Gadafy to relinquish power.
The additional measures include 11 energy companies, the last remaining in Libya's oil and gas sector that had not faced sanctions before, and bring the total number of firms punished by EU measures to 46. Thirty-eight people from the Libyan leader's inner circle also face a ban on travel to the EU and an asset freeze.
Following a meeting in Luxembourg, EU ministers warned Col Gadafy that more punitive measures could be imposed in the future to cut off his access to cash.
Elsewhere, Moussa Koussa, a former Libyan foreign minister and long-time top aide to Muammar Gadafy, is going to Doha for meetings with the Qatari government and Libyan representatives, Britain said today.
An international contact group is due to hold talks on Libya's future in the Qatari capital today. Mr Koussa will not participate in the meeting but is expected to hold talks on the sidelines, British sources said.
Mr Koussa, the most prominent Libyan defector, sought refuge in Britain on March 30th. A friend said he quit in protest at attacks on civilians by Gaddafi's forces.
The former spy chief was later questioned by Scottish police over the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, which killed 270 people, but the British government.
Libyan rebels rejected an African Union peace plan yesterday because it did not include the removal of Gadafy, who they accused of indiscriminate attacks on his own people.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, hailed as a hero by the rebels, led calls for military intervention in Libya and his warplanes were the first to attack Col Gadafy's forces.
In a barbed reference to the Nato takeover, Mr Juppe added: "Nato must play its role fully. It wanted to take the lead in operations, we accepted that."
Nato is unpopular among many insurgents, both because they believe it initially reacted slowly to government attacks and because it has killed almost 20 rebels in two mistaken bombings.
The rebels took up position about 40km west of Ajdabiyah today after clashes yesterday that left at least three of their fighters dead in a rocket attack. There was no sign of fighting today between Ajdabiyah and the oil port of Brega where the eastern front has see-sawed between the combatants for weeks.
The Red Cross said it would send a team to Misrata to help civilians trapped by fighting. Rebel leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil said after talks with an African peace mission in rebel-held Benghazi yesterday: "The African Union initiative does not include the departure of Gadafy and his sons from the Libyan political scene, therefore it is outdated."
The AU said in a statement it would continue the mission. Col Gadafy's son, Saif, ruled out his father stepping down, calling the idea ridiculous.
Reuters