People wounded in fighting in Libya's besieged city of Sirte are dying on the operating table because fuel for the hospital generator has run out, medical workers fleeing a worsening humanitarian crisis in the city said on Sunday.
The birth-place of deposed Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi, Sirte is one of two towns still holding out against the country's new rulers and civilians are caught in the middle of fierce fighting now in its third week.
The interim government, or National Transitional Council (NTC), declared a two-day truce to allow civilians to escape, but people emerging from the city said they knew nothing of the cease-fire, and that the shooting had not stopped.
"Doctors start operating, then the power goes. They have a few litres of fuel for the generators, then the lights go out when they operate," said a man who gave his name as Al-Sadiq, who said he ran the dialysis unit at Sirte's main hospital.
"I saw a child of 14 die on the operating table because the power went out during the operation," he told Reuters on the western outskirts of the city.
Aid workers from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) who brought medical supplies into Sirte on Saturday could not reach the hospital because of shooting.
That hospital has now become the focus of concerns about the humanitarian crisis in the city, with residents describing how doctors are trying to treat civilians injured in the fighting without adequate supplies.
"It's a catastrophe. Patients are dying every day for need of oxygen," said Mohammed Shnaq, a biochemist at the hospital who fled early on Sunday during a lull in the shooting. He said private pharmacies in Sirte handed over their supplies to the hospital after its own stocks ran out a week ago, but these were now running out too.
The Red Cross was hoping to make another trip into Sirte to reach the hospital.
"We really need to and we want to assist civilians inside Sirte and this hospital, the medical personnel and the war wounded," said ICRC spokesman Souad Messaoudi.
"This is our role, this is our mandate and we want to take the opportunity to remind all the parties to the conflict to allow safe access for medical personnel and spare as much as possible civilian lives." A commander of an anti-Qadhafi unit east of Sirte said the truce expired on Sunday, but a full assault was still out of the question because civilians remained in the city.
"Sirte is still difficult there are still more than 15,00 persons inside. We cannot sacrifice them," said Colonel Hamed Al-Hasi, commander of the Qatar brigade. He said NTC forces would for now instead be targeting the district of Bouhadi, just to the south of Sirte. He said a captured Qadhafi loyalist had told them Mutassim, one of the deposed Libyan leader's sons, was in the district.
"We're concentrating since last night until today on Bouhadi area ... he said. "If we catch Mutassim, things will calm down." Nato warplanes were more in evidence than in previous days, with aircraft flying unusually low over the city. In one 10-minute period there was a steady rumble from bombs dropping on an area south of the city, a Reuters reporter said.
Libyans ended Qadhafi's 42-year rule in August when rebel fighters stormed the capital. Qadhafi and several of his sons are still at large, and his supporters hold Sirte and a second town of Bani Walid, south of Tripoli.
Qadhafi's supporters are too weak to re-gain power, but their resistance is frustrating the new rulers' efforts to start building the post-Qadhafi Libya.
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