Live Blog - Libya Feb 23

(All times are local in Libya GMT+2)

February 23, 2011

5.25pm: A National Libyan Airline plane is circling the airspace off the coast of Malta, Al Jazeera's Cal Perry reports from Valletta. "The plane is saying they are running out of fuel and need to land .. they are negotiating with the runway about landing," Perry says.

But soldiers have been deployed and authorities are "nervous" about what could be on board the plane, he adds.

5.18pm: Al Jazeera's Hoda Abdel Hamid reports from Tobruk, around 140km west of the border with Egypt.

5.07pm: A video showing mass burials in Tripoli on February 22 was posted by the site OneDayOnEarth. View it here.

4.50pm: The International Criminal Court says it cannot investigate crimes in Libya unless the country's authorities accept the court's jurisdiction or the UN Security Council refers the situation to the ICC

The Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC issued this statement:

The decision to do justice in Libya should be taken by the Libyan people. Currently, Libya is not a State Party to the Rome Statute. Therefore, intervention by the ICC on the alleged crimes committed in Libya can occur only if the Libyan authorities accept the jurisdiction of the Court, (through article 12(3) of the Rome Statute). In the absence of such step, the United Nations Security Council can decide to refer the situation to the Court. The Office of the Prosecutor will act only after either decision is taken".

4.40pm: The UK foreign minister says that Libyans who violate human rights should be held to account, news agency Reuters reports.

4.27pm: A Libyan airforce plane has crashed near Benghazi after the crew bailed out, the country's Quryna Newspaper reports. The newspaper said the crew had orders to bomb Benghazi, but refused to carry them out.

4.17pm: Major General Suleiman Mahmoud, a commander in Libyan army in Tobruk, is now on the side of the Libyan people. He called Gaddafi "a tyrant" and told Al Jazeera "the people in the army are steadfast" in the city.

4.10pm: Italy is increasingly concerned about the exodus of immigrants from Libya that could be heading towards Europe. This comes as the interior ministers from six nations - France, Greece, Cyprus, Malta and Italy - plan to meet.

4.03pm: More from Al Jazeera's Hoda Abdel Hamid in Tobruk. She reported seeing hundreds of Egyptians fleeing Libya with everything they own. "People are still very scared, especially after Gaddafi's speech, and thought it best to leave the country now," she said.

3.59pm: Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose security forces crushed protests against him in 2009, condemned state brutality against protesters in Libya. He said on Wednesday:

How can a leader subject his own people to a shower of machine-guns, tanks and bombs? How can a leader bomb his own people, and afterwards say 'I will kill anyone who says anything?'

3.51pm: Italy's foreign ministry has said attempts to crush a revolt against Gaddafi's four-decade rule have killed as many as 1,000 people in Libya.

3.41pm: Libyan protesters claim to have taken over Misurata, which would be the largest city in the western half in the country to fall into their hands, news agency AP reports. There are reports that six people were killed and 200 were injured in fighting there.

Libyans told AFP that the anti-Gaddafi movement was in firm control from the Egyptian border through Tobruk and Libya's second city Benghazi until Ajdabiya, further west along the coast.

3.38pm: This is the first time that the changes sweeping the Arab world have hit a major oil producer and there are now fears that the spike in oil prices could hurt the fragile global economy.

Al Jazeera's Nick Spicer filed this report:

3.36pm: German oil firm Wintershall said it had stopped oil production in Libya due to the security situation in the violence-hit country.

3.27pm: As much as a quarter of Libyan oil output has been shut down, the Reuters news agency reports. Libya produces almost 2 per cent of the world's oil.

3.19pm: Off the coast of Malta, ships are patrolling following reports of Libyan vessels in the area. It is unclear whether these Libyan vessels are potential defectors, or if they are Gaddafi's navy ships, Al Jazeera's Cal Perry said from Valletta.

URL du billet: http://blogs.aljazeera.net/africa/2011/02/22/live-blog-libya-feb-23