Tripoli:
Deep cracks opened in Moammar Gaddafi's regime on Monday, as reports circulated of a bloody crackdown on protest in the capital Tripoli, Libyan government officials at home and abroad resigned, and two air force pilots defected.
Pro-Gaddafi militia drove around Tripoli with loudspeakers and told people not to leave their homes, witnesses said, as security forces sought to contain the unrest that has swept eastern parts of the country - leaving the second-largest city of Benghazi in protesters' control - and to stop it from engulfing the capital of 2 (m) million people.
State TV said the military had "stormed the hideouts of saboteurs" and urged the public to back security forces.
Meanwhile, early on Tuesday morning, video was shown on state television of Gaddafi himself insisting that he was still in Tripoli, apparently in a bid to disprove rumours that he had left the country.
It was impossible to verify the location and date of Gaddafi's appearance as it was not live.
The mercurial leader was shown for less than a minute, sitting in a car in front of what appeared to be his residence and holding an umbrella out of the passenger side door.
He told an interviewer that he had wanted to go to the capital's Green Square to talk to his supporters, but the rain had stopped him.
"Oh, it is raining... I was going to talk with the youth in Green Square, and spend the night with them tonight, but it is raining and that is a good omen, so I just want to show them that I am in Tripoli and not in Venezuela. Don't believe the broadcasts of those stray dogs," he said, referring to foreign media reports that he had left the country.
Tripoli was largely shut down on Monday, with schools, government offices and most shops closed, except for a few bakeries, said residents, who hunkered down in their homes.
Armed members of pro-government organisations called "Revolutionary Committees" hunted for protesters in Tripoli's old city, said one protester named Fathi.
The eruption of turmoil in the capital after seven days of protests and bloody clashes in Libya's eastern cities sharply escalated the challenge to Gaddafi.
His security forces have unleashed the bloodiest crackdown of any Arab country against the wave of protests sweeping the region, which toppled the leaders of Egypt and Tunisia.
At least 233 people have been killed so far, according to New York-based Human Rights Watch.
The heaviest fighting so far has been in the east.
Security forces in Benghazi opened fire on Sunday on protesters storming police stations and government buildings.
But in several instances, units of the military sided with protesters.
By Monday, protesters had claimed control of the city, overrunning its main security headquarters, called the Katiba.
Celebrating protesters raised the flag of the country's old monarchy, which was toppled in 1969 by a Gaddafi-led military coup, over Benghazi's main courthouse and on tanks around the city.
Fire raged on Monday at the People's Hall in Tripoli, the main building for government gatherings where the country's equivalent of a parliament holds sessions several times a year, the pro-government news website Qureyna said.
On Monday, protesters called for a demonstration in Tripoli's central Green Square and in front of Gaddafi's residence, but witnesses in various neighbourhoods described a scene of intimidation: helicopters hovering above the main seaside boulevard and pro-Gaddafi gunmen firing from moving cars and even shooting at the facades of homes to terrify the population.
Youths trying to gather in the streets were forced to scatter and run for cover by the gunfire, according to several witnesses, who like many reached in Tripoli by The Associated Press spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
They said people wept over the bodies of the dead left in the street.
Communications to the capital appeared to have been cut, and residents could not be reached by phone from outside the country.