NATO says Libya attack may have killed civilians
NATO is acknowledging that one of its airstrikes in Libya may have caused civilian casualties.
The errant air strike happened early Sunday in the east of the capital, Tripoli, and was due to a "weapons system failure," a NATO official said.
Libyan officials say nine civilians were killed, including two children. Officials took reporters to the building that was hit, where children's toys, teacups and dust-covered mattresses could be seen amid the rubble.
A NATO commander said it "regrets the loss of innocent civilian lives and takes great care in conducting strikes." NATO said it has launched 4,400 airstrikes since the beginning of attacks on Libya, which the alliance says are meant to protect civilians from leader Moammar Gadhafi's regime.
This is the third admission by the alliance that they have hit an unintended target, the most recent coming Saturday when NATO said it mistakenly hit a convoy of rebel fighters opposed to Gadhafi near the oil port of Brega.
Journalists at the scene of the Tripoli bombing said rescue workers were digging through the rubble of the house with their bare hands before bringing in a bulldozer and equipment to cut through steel cables enmeshed in the concrete.
The BBC's Jeremy Bowen said he saw two bodies at the scene, one in an ambulance and one being taken out of the rubble. He said journalists were also taken to a hospital in Tripoli and shown the same two bodies. In all, he said he saw the bodies of three adults and two young children whom authorities said were killed in the strike early Sunday.
NATO has previously accused Gadhafi of using mosques, parks and university buildings as shields for his military operations.
NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu told The Associated Press in Brussels on Saturday that Libyan claims of more than 850 civilians dying in air strikes were bogus. The alliance gave no figures on casualties.
It also called Libyan government claims that its airstrikes are purposely targeting civilians "outrageous."
The alliance has been ramping up the pressure on Gadhafi's more than four-decade-old regime with bombing raids since March.
In another government-run tour on Saturday, journalists were invited to take pictures of Tripoli's Fatih University, where a three-storey building had been badly damaged by what officials said was a NATO airstrike.
Students and faculty told reporters an explosion tore through the building sometime midday Friday, though accounts differed on the timing.
