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ZAWIYAH/RAS LANUF, Libya (Reuters) – Libyan polity forces decorated the western municipality of Zawiyah on Sat after rebels crowd them discover in unmerciful fighting, patch in the east, opponents of Muammar Gaddafi pushed toward his bag town.

Gaddafi's forces entered Zawiyah at 6 a.m. (11 p.m. EST on Friday) with hundreds of soldiers with tanks, said Youssef Shagan, the protest obligate spokesman in the town, 50 km (30 miles) west of the top Tripoli.

"Our grouping fought backwards ... We hit won for today and civilians are assembling in the square," he said.

The rebels said a counter-attack could become soon.

People anti to Gaddafi's 41-year rule hit been conflict his forces in Zawiyah for more than a week, after rebels took over swathes of orient Libya in an uprising inspired by the overthrow of stager rulers in Egypt and Tunisia this year.

Shagan said Gaddafi forces had fired broad exploding rounds in bicentric streets and dragged grouping from their homes. There were many casualties among civilians, rebels and soldiers, he said, though he could not give a fine number.

"We captured 3 APCs, two tanks and digit pick-up after an distance and a half of fighting," he said, adding that polity snipers had taken up positions in Zawiyah.

By mid-morning, Gaddafi's forces had regrouped and were manning checkpoints whatever 3 km (1.8 miles) from the center, where a protest plane vowed to fight to the death.

"Gaddafi module never start this city. He module never ordered measure here. The exclusive way for him to start the municipality is when we are every dead. He has to blackball us every to curb the city," the rebel, who gave his name as Ibrahim, said by telephone.

Rebels in orient Libya said they were actuation boost west after dynamical discover forces hardcore to Gaddafi from the lubricator municipality of Ras Lanuf on Friday. They said they had fired on an grey helicopter swooping over Ras Lanuf on Saturday.

Doctors said at small 26 grouping had died in Friday's conflict around Ras Lanuf and what rebels said was an advise by Gaddafi's forces on an arms store on the bounds of the orient municipality of Benghazi, where the uprising began in mid-February.

In Zawiyah, a communicator for Britain's Sky news said a temporary infirmary ordered up in a masjid was overwhelmed. She said Gaddafi forces nearby the infirmary were firing on ambulances.

Rebel fighters said they had taken the municipality of Bin Jawad whatever 525 km easterly of municipality and were agitated on toward Sirte, Gaddafi's hard incommunicative bag town.

There was no sign of Gaddafi's forces or rebels in Bin Jawad on Sat morning. Some rebels said they had sent intelligence missions there, patch the important protest obligate massed in Ras Lanuf to advise ahead.

The stylish conflict suggested front lines between polity forces and the rebels, who are conflict with everything from captured tanks to sticks, were farther from country and could agitate quickly.

The protest alarum waved over a field indirect in Ras Lanuf on Sat and there was no sign of pro-Gaddafi soldiers, though the polity had denied the protest claim on weekday to be in curb of the town, 660 km easterly of Tripoli.

At the incoming to the town, half a dozen soldiers manned a protest checkpoint. Asked if rebels were in charge of the whole town, digit soldier replied: "Everything, 100 percent, it is completely safe."

A period earlier, flashes and thuds had resounded from conflict around Ras Lanuf, an lubricator terminal of the OPEC producer that sits on the sea coast. Helicopters had strafed positions of rebels, who fired rifles back.

On Sat the offices of the Harouge Oil Operations, a key lubricator terminal, were forsaken and rebels commandeered vehicles.

"Gaddafi stole from the grouping and today the grouping are attractive it back," said digit armed looter, Nasr al-Abdili, who was attractive a pick-up truck.

The streets were calm, with grouping queuing for bread.

"It's not a normal situation, but you hit to be prepared for this situation. I am very pleased, we every are. We are finished with Gaddafi," said Saleh Mohamed, 37, who entireness as an administrator in an lubricator firm.

The sicken is the bloodiest yet against long-entrenched rulers in the Middle East and North Africa.

News of the conflict took U.S. vulgar prices to their maximal levels since September 2008, and Brent vulgar futures for April delivery winking at $115.97 a barrel on Friday, up $1.18.

The International Energy Agency said the sicken had closed most 60 proportionality of Libya's 1.6 million bpd (barrels per day) lubricator output. [ID:nWEB3662] The loss, cod largely to the flight of thousands of external lubricator workers, module batter the economy.

Libyan vulgar exports were ordered to motion in the coming days. "You today hit a status where everything is pointing toward a more or less rank shutdown of Libyan production," said Samuel Ciszuk, a grownup shrink with IHS Energy.

The upheaval has caused a helper crisis on the African border, where tens of thousands of external workers hit fled to safety. An planetary transfer is low way, reducing the sort of refugees stranded in tented camps.

Western body hit urged Gaddafi to go and are considering different options including the enforcement of a no-fly zone, but are shy most involving their militaries after wars in Afghanistan and Irak that were deeply unpopular at home.

Mustafa Gheriani, a spokesman for the protest Feb 17th coalition, told Reuters in metropolis the planetary accord seemed to be inactivity to wager who would intend the bunk hand.

"It's most who can stop his breath low the liquid longest and I think it module be us," he said.

(Additional news by Michael Georgy in Tripoli; writing by Philippa Fletcher; editing by Mark Trevelyan)

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