The battle for smaller, pivotal towns throughout the vast Libyan desert intensified on Thursday, with the opposition saying Moamer Gaddafi's forces have attempted to move in and solidify control of non-coastal towns, dpa reported.
The Libyan opposition reported that Gaddafi's forces attacked the al-Wazin crossing connecting Libya to Tunisia by drawing the rebels out to fight in the western city of Zintan.
This comes a week after a number of Gaddafi loyalists, including two army generals, handed themselves over to Tunisian border guards after rebels temporarily took control of the crossing.
In the east, the opposition Brnieq news website said three rebels were killed and eight injured in a Grad-rocket attack by Gaddafi's forces on the city of Kufra in south-eastern Libya on Thursday.
Gaddafi's brigades were accompanied by 1500 Chadian mercenaries who crossed the Libyan-Chad border, according to Brnieq.
The brigades reached Kufra after passing through the north-eastern coastal town of Brega, with fears mounting that the troops may try to move north-east to the rebel stronghold of Benghazi, said opposition activists online.
The move to Kufra is also an attempt to control the Sirir oil fields now held by the opposition there, according to Brnieq.
This comes a day after the rebels' Interim Transitional National Council (ITNC) said it applauded the decision by US President Barack Obama to ease sanctions on the sale of oil controlled by the opposition in Libya.
"Revenues from the sale of oil will do much to provide urgently needed aid and assistance," said the ITNC.
Although rebels said this week that the Libyan army has withdrawn from the centre of the key north-western city of Misurata, Gaddafi's troops continue to fight for the city's seaport and are still in control of the city's airport.
An online activist based in Misurata, who is part of Shabab Libya, a Libyan youth social network, wrote online that remnants of Gaddafi's brigades remain in the city, despite being pushed back earlier this week.
"Despite promises of a ceasefire, Gaddafi continues to shell Misurata and the western areas in what has become a massacre of innocent civilians," the ITNC said in a statement.
The opposition based in the eastern city of Benghazi said 12 rebels were killed in a NATO airstrike a day earlier in Misurata, while the government in Tripoli said NATO airstrikes killed an unknown number of people in the vicinity of the capital.
"In war, mistakes happen that can be difficult to avoid," said ITNC spokesman Shams el-din Abdulmullah.
The rebel group said the attack also left 40 people injured. This is the third time a NATO airstrike has killed rebels since the Western military alliance assumed command of operations over Libya at the end of March.
NATO aircraft struck a number of combat vehicles about 16 kilometres south-east of Misurata's port, targeting an area it had earlier attacked at a large group of pro-Gaddafi forces, a NATO official told dpa.
"We cannot independently verify reports that these vehicles were operated by opposition forces. We regret any loss of human life," the official said, adding that there were no attacks on any buildings in Misurata itself.
Additionally, broadcaster Al-Jazeera reported that seven rebel fighters in Misurata were killed overnight when forces loyal to Moamer Gaddafi hit their checkpoint with artillery fire and rockets, a local doctor said.
Meanwhile, a Libyan military spokesman was quoted on state television on Thursday as saying that two NATO attacks - one in the eastern suburb of Tripoli and one south of Tripoli - killed civilians late Wednesday. No details on the number of casualties were given.
A Libyan official quoted in state media said the head of Foreign Affairs for the Libyan parliament, Suleiman Shehoumi, on Wednesday discussed NATO's "violations" with a United Nations team in Tripoli.
Shehoumi raised the issue of NATO attacks on civilian and administrative buildings, schools, hospitals, communication centres and what Libyan officials have called an assassination attempt on Gaddafi at his Bab al-Aziziya compound this week, according to Libyan state media.
This comes as the US ambassador to Tripoli, Gene Cretz, told reporters in Washington Wednesday that the death toll from the conflict in Libya could range from 10,000 to 30,000, adding that estimates of the dead are difficult to determine while the fighting was still ongoing.
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