Colonel Gaddafi vowed to fight on as the Libyan state apparatus teetered on the brink of collapse.
Speaking in a televised address on Tuesday evening, Gaddafi, who has been in power for 41 years, vowed to fight on and die a “martyr” and called on suppporters to “fight” anti-government protesters who he branded “Islamists”.
But despite Gaddafi’s defiance army units continued to defect to the side of the protesters who now reportedly control the of the east of the country including the cities of Tobruk and Benghazi.
The latest key official to desert Gaddafi is interior minister Abdel Fattah Younes al Abidi.
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Youssef Sawani, a senior aide to Gaddafi’s son Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, also resigned “to express dismay against violence”.
In light of these latest renouncements of Gaddafi’s rule The British foreign minister, William Hague has said that there are “many indications of the structure of the state collapsing in Libya”.
A least 450 people are believed to have died in the capital of Tripoli since the trouble started and there are reports that roaming gangs of foreign mercenaries employed by Gaddafi are mowing down unarmed civilians.
A Royal Navy warship has been despatched to rescue 3,500 Britons trapped in Libya.
