- Rebels chant 'The martyrs' blood is not spilled in vain!'
- 12-year-old peppered by shrapnel is among the wounded
- Libya’s deputy foreign minister suggests Gaddafi wants fighting to end
- Scottish prosecutors to meet British Foreign Office over Musa Kusa arrival
A Turkish cruise ship turned into a makeshift hospital is evacuating more than 250 injured people from Libya after stopping in Misrata and Benghazi.
Ali Davutoglu, the Turkish consul general in Benghazi, said the ship Ankara had brought 230 passengers from Misrata and was picking up another 100 from Benghazi before sailing to the Turkish port of Cesme, where hospitals were preparing to welcome them.
The ship’s rescue mission came as Libyan rebels pushed into the strategic oil town of Brega while a government envoy began a trip to Europe to discuss an end to the fighting.
Rescue: Injured Libyans aboard the Turkish ship the Ankara, after 300 seriously wounded people were evacuated from the besieged Libyan towns of Misrata and Benghazi
Misrata is the only western city still under rebel control, with at least one person killed and several injured after government shelling yesterday.
While the eastern half of Libya fell quickly under rebel control, Misrata, 125 miles southeast of the capital Tripoli, was one of two western cities that rose up early in the revolt against Gaddafi.
His elite forces besieged Misrata for weeks, cutting off food and water supplies and power lines, but the rebels have stood their ground.
The regime has retaken the other city, Zawiya.
The Ankara, shown docking in Benghazi, is to head to the Turkish port of Cesme, where hospitals were preparing to welcome the injured
Wounded: Rebels stood firm in Misrata while hundreds of injured people were rescued from the western town
Dozens of men, many nursing gunshot wounds and missing limbs, lay on thin mats in the hull of the Ankara cruise ship today, speaking of brutal government attacks and young rebels struggling to fend them off.
Mohammed Abu Libous, 37, said he and seven relatives were working in a bakery on the outskirts of Misrata, rebel forces' last major stronghold in western Libya, when about 20 Gadhafi troops entered in three tanks and started harassing local residents.
They entered his shop and told him and his brother to surrender their weapons. When they said they had none, the troops took them out in the street. They shot his brother through the stomach and him once in each thigh, he said.
‘While I was on the ground bleeding, they bound the others and took them away,’ he said, adding that the troops stole all their money, cell phones and rings.
The Turkish government has funded the Ankara’s, and the Turkish Red Crescent and Islamic aid group IHH provided staff and supplies, he said.
Twelve Turkish jets and a frigate provided protection as the ferry docked at Misrata on Saturday, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
People cheer while holding bouquets of flowers as the Ankara arrives at a port in Benghazi
Defiance: The crowd chanted 'The martyrs' blood is not spilled in vain!' as the Ankara rescued the wounded
A few hundred young men gathered on the dock, cheering, chanting and raising their arms and rifles as two tugboats guided the Ankara to port.
Passengers - some with limbs in casts and bandages - appeared on the top deck, waving to the crowd below, which chanted, ‘The martyrs' blood is not spilled in vain!’
Inside, doctors and nurses tended to the wounded in what was once a cruise ship. In one room, a bar had been converted into a pharmacy, with bandages and medicines where bottles and glasses once were. A nurse in a sanitary mask manned the reception desk.
Nearby, a dozen men in their 20s lounged on couches that likely once held tourists. Most had at least one limb in a cast, and all said they had been wounded defending their city.
‘It was my first time holding a gun,’ said Ibrahim Khelif, 25, whose left leg had been shattered by a hand grenade. ‘Anyone who could get one and figure out how to work it would go out in the street and fight.’
Many of the patients onboard have serious injuries, with one man losing his left leg after a mortar attack last month.
Bashir, a 41-year-old prosecutor, said he wanted the international community to intervene and oust Gadhafi.
‘The world has said he is no longer a legitimate ruler,’ he told Reuters. ‘Now it needs to come get rid of him.’
Other injured passengers on the Ankara included a 13-year-old boy who had been shot by a sniper and a 12-year-old whose face and torso had been peppered with shrapnel after a rocket exploded near him.
Rebels now hold much of the country's east, where they have created a provisional government in Benghazi and are working to improve training and coordination of their forces to pursue Gaddafi's ouster by force of arms.
Under instruction: New volunteer rebel fighters receive training on how to use a recoilless rifle at a military camp in Benghazi
A Libyan rebel walks past the charred remains of opposition vehicles, which were allegedly struck by coalition planes, days before the rebels retook Brega
A hospital official still in Misrata said by telephone that two of his cousins were aboard the ship. They and many other men were shot in the legs with ‘bullets that destroy the bones’ after Gadhafi's forces interrogated them, he said.
‘They have to remove their legs,’ said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
As he spoke, he said heavy shelling renewed yesterday evening, with anti-tank fire, mortars and tank shells crashing around the city center for over an hour. He said it was too dangerous to dispatch medics to see if there were any wounded.
Interrogation: Former Libyan foreign minister Musa Kusa is to be questioned by Scottish police about the Lockerbie bombing after arriving in the UK last week
Misrata officials have said in recent days that Gaddafi's troops also were trying to shell and destroy the city's port to take away the rebels' last lifeline to the outside world.
The ship’s journey came as Brega was seized by rebel forces.
An envoy of Moammar Gadhafi told Greece's prime minister Sunday that the Libyan leader was seeking a way out of the crisis.
Abdul-Ati al-Obeidi will travel next to Turkey and Malta in a sign that Gaddafi's regime may be softening its hard line in the face of the sustained attacks.
Meanwhile, Scottish police are to meet with officials from the Foreign Office to discuss the recent arrival of former Libyan foreign minister Musa Kusa in the UK.
Prosecutors have submitted a formal request to meet with Mr Kusa to question him about the 1988 Lockerbie bombing.
Foreign Secretary William Hague said the request would be granted, adding yesterday: ‘We want more information about past events.
‘The Crown Office in Scotland want to talk to him about what has happened in the past, such as Lockerbie.
‘My officials are discussing with the Crown Office tomorrow how to go about that.’
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1373175/Libya-Hundreds-injured-rescued-violence-Turkish-aid-ship.html#ixzz1IYJTlEVD
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