BBC News with Marion Marshall
Forces opposed to the Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi have scored an important victory over government troops by beating off an attack on the northeastern town of Brega, where there's a big oil
installation
. Brega is close to Ajdabiya, the largest town near the opposition stronghold of Benghazi. More details from John Simpson, who's been in Brega.
Most people in Ajdabiya probably
assume
d that Colonel Gaddafi's forces were on their way and that there was little between them and the rebel capital Benghazi, nearly 100 miles away. But that's not what happened. Volunteers came pouring in from Benghazi and Ajdabiya. A senior officer sent down from Benghazi suggested to me that in the fighting that followed, the Gaddafi army may have
run out of
ammunition. By late afternoon, the soldiers were
chased out
altogether and al-Brega was full of jubilant rebels firing their guns in the air. It's not a final defeat certainly, but it is an important reverse.
Britain and France are to send aircraft and ships to Tunisia to
repatriate
tens of thousands of Egyptians stranded there after fleeing from the violence in Libya. The refugees are currently living in
dire
conditions, with many more still waiting to cross over the border from Libya.
A senior United Nations official in Ivory Coast has confirmed that electricity and water supplies have been cut to the north of the country. The region is traditionally opposed to Laurent Gbagbo, the man who's refusing to leave office despite an international consensus that he lost last November's election. The UN official, Ndolamb Ngokwey, said the Ivorian electricity company had told him the cuts were political with no technical reason for them.