Battles raged in Libya, with fighters of National Transitional Council were paying heavy losses as they push towards the remaining bastions of Muammar Gaddafi.
Battles raged in Libya, with fighters of National Transitional Council were paying heavy losses as they push towards the remaining bastions of Muammar Gaddafi.
The losses were heavy in Sirte, where NTC fighters were battling their way to the heart of the sprawling Mediterranean city, site of a Gaddafi compound and bunkers.
Fighting which raged into the night on Tuesday centered around the Mahari hotel in eastern Sirte where NTC combatants engaged loyalist troops in close quarter skirmishes, a commander said.
"More than 10 of our fighters have been killed today in face-to-face fighting near Mahari hotel," said the commander, who asked not to be named as the information was sensitive.
FIERCE CLACHES 
The NTC fighters and Gaddafi’s diehards clashed "in street fights and shot at each other from close range with Kalashnikovs and rocket-propelled grenades," the commander said.
Early on Tuesday, NTC fighters had captured Sirte's port, marking a key victory in the battle for control of Gaddafi’s hometown.
But they expected a ferocious fight for control of the compound, the nerve center of the remaining resistance where some members of the strongman’s family are thought to be holed up.
NTC fighter Fateh Marimri reported heavy fighting around the Mahari hotel.
"They are using heavy weapons but we are not, as we want to cause minimum damage to civilians," Marimri told AFP.
"They are now fighting us in civilian clothes and there are African mercenaries everywhere in Sirte."
He also said Kadhafi'saddafi’s family members were inside Sirte, backed by a "large number of his forces", but did not give names.
FEARFUL CIVILIANS FLEEING
Thousands of fearful civilians have been fleeing Sirte, 360 kilometers (225 miles) east of Tripoli, as the new regime's forces close in from the east, south and west.
Some said Gaddafi’s forces had been trying to prevent people from leaving.
"There's no food, no electricity; we were eating just bread," Saraj al-Tuweish, who got out with his extended family on Tuesday, told AFP.
"I've been trying for 10 days to get out and every time the army forced us back.”
"We would go the checkpoint and they would refuse, they would shoot in the air. Today we used a dirt road early in the morning and we managed to escape."
GADDAFI AWAITING MARTYRDOM
Meanwhile, Gaddafi had a radio message hailing through it the resistance put up by his loyalists in his other stronghold, Bani Walid, where the NTC said four of their fighters were killed and 11 wounded in fierce clashes Tuesday.
In his radio message, a transcript of which was carried by a loyalist website, he said he was still fighting and was ready to die a martyr.
"Heroes have resisted and fallen as martyrs and we too are awaiting martyrdom," Gaddafi said.
He praised the fierce resistance put up in Bani Walid, which had been a major recruiting ground for his elite army units.
"You should know that I am on the ground with you," he said. "Through your jihad, you are imitating the exploits of your ancestors."
