Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Dragging Out the Day

2045 GMT: Doctors have suggested that regime forces in Yemen used a form of nerve gas on pro-democracy protesters in Sanaa in a violent clash on Tuesday night.

The soldiers fired warning shots into the air before shooting gas and, it is claimed, live bullets into the crowd, killing one and injuring at least 75.

“The material in this gas makes people convulse for hours. It paralyzes them. They couldn’t move at all. We tried to give them oxygen but it didn’t work,” said Amaar Nujaim, a field doctor who works for Islamic Relief.

“We are seeing symptoms in the patient’s nerves, not in their respiratory systems. I’m 90 percent sure its nerve gas and not tear gas that was used,” said Sami Zaid, a doctor at the Science and Technology Hospital in Sanaa.

Mohammad Al-Sheikh, a pathologist at the same hospital, said that some of the victims had lost their muscular control and were forced to wear diapers.

“We have never seen tear gas cause these symptoms. We fear it may be a dangerous gas that is internationally forbidden,” Al-Sheikh said.

2040 GMT: King Mohammed VI of Morocco, in a nationally-television speech, has promised "comprehensive constitutional reforms".

1830 GMT: An engineer who works at the Sidrah oil terminal in north-central Libya says air strikes damaged storage tanks and other facilities such as power and water plants. Mohamed al-Hashemi said saw government warplanes attacking the terminal. Four storage tanks, each holding about 150,000 gallons, exploded.

Regime and opposition forces have blamed each other for the incident. An opposition spokesman said several oil installations in the town of Ras Lanuf are on fire after being bombed by regime planes.

Representatives of the opposition National Transition Council have met French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris and Swiss President Micheline Calmy-Rey in Geneva. The Portuguese Foreign Minister Luis Amado has agreed to meet a Qaddafi envoy,Mohammed Tahir Siyala, who earlier presented the regime's position to Maltese Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi.

1735 GMT: London's Evening Standard reports:

Squatters occupied the £11  million ($18 million) London home of Colonel Gaddafi's son [Saif Al Islam] today in protest against the dictator's regime.

A group calling themselves Topple The Tyrants said they took over the house because they "didn't trust the British government to properly seize Gaddafi's corrupt assets".

The squatters unfurled a banner bearing a picture of Colonel Gaddafi and the slogan "Out Of Libya Out Of London" from the top of the house....

Residents reported the burglar alarm going off at the property in Hampstead Garden Suburb. A man arrived in a black Porsche and had to be calmed down by police before driving away.

"It's Official: Tunisia Now Freer than the US" (Cole)
Libya Video: The Battle for Zawiyah
Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Unsteady as She Goes
Libya (and Beyond) LiveBlog: Unsteady as She Goes
Latest from Libya: Live Feed from Al Jazeera English

1730 GMT: Daily News Egypt is reporting 13 killed and 140 injured in yesterday's clashes in Egypt around a Coptic Christian demonstration.

1720 GMT: One person has reportedly been killed and another injured when unidentified militants opened fire against campaigners supporting President Ali Abdullah Saleh in the Valley of Hadrmawt in southern Yemen. The assailants were allegedly flying a "separatist flag".

1715 GMT: In opposition-held Ras Lanuf in north-central Libya, clashes have killed at least two people and injured 17, with the toll expected to increase. Ambulances are rushing to an oil plant set on fire by an attack.

Lama Hasan of American ABC News reports bombings, targeting arms depots, south of Benghazi.

1628 GMT: Reuters reports from witnesses that regime forces have now taken the main square in Zawiyah, 55 km (35 miles) west of Tripoli, after five days of attacks. The witnesses say opposition fighters have retreated but plan to attack later.

1625 GMT: A LiveFeed is showing images of a mass rally in Benghazi, the second-largest city in Libya and the base of the opposition National Transitional Council.

1605 GMT: In Algeria, the opposition Rally for Culture and Democracy has suspended its activities in Parliament.

The RCD said it had taken the decision becauase of the suppression of protests, called for Algiers each Saturday, by security forces and attacks on its members as well as the refusal of Parliament to engage with important issues.

The RCD has 16 deputies and one senator in the Parliament.

1555 GMT: In another developing story, Egyptian Prime Minister Essam Sharam has reportedly cut short his cabinet meeting to meet an envoy from Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi.

General Abdelrahman al-Zawi, the Libyan Deputy Minister of Defence, flew in a Government jet to Cairo earlier today (see 1240 GMT).

The Italian Foreign Minister has said that regime envoys have also flown to Brussels to talk to European and NATO officials.

AFP reports that scores of opposition fighters, packed into dozens of vehicles, have fallen back to the oil town of Ras Lanuf in north-central Libya after sustained artillery and air strikes.

1545 GMT: Back from an academic break to find reports that the Egyptian Army has cleared out the protest camp in Tahrir Square in Cairo. An activist sends the message, "Tahrir has fallen. We need to re-group, mass up, and re-capture it again. We've been letting Tahrir down, folks. It's that simple."

The Army's operation followed an attack on the protesters by hundreds of men reportedly carrying knives and swords.

Military police moved against the camp 10 days ago, chasing and beating protesters, but Egypt's Supreme Military Command quickly offered an apology for the clashes.

1240 GMT: Al Jazeera English's Ayman Mohyeldin reports, "Private Libyan jet has landed in Cairo carrying senior Libyan military general." The general has been named as Abdulrahman Al-Zawi, the Army's head of supply and logistics.

Two other Libyan Government planes have reportedly flown to Athens and Vienna.

1235 GMT: Journalist Jon Jensen sends in a stream of reports via Twitter from Tahrir Square in Cairo, "Military called into Tahrir just ran away after massive rock throwing bout between pro- and anti-Tahrir protesters. More clashes. People running everywhere. The sky is full of rocks. Military was unable to quell Tahrir clashes when they broke out."

1145 GMT: Egyptian political parties and figures are calling for a million-person march on Friday in Tahrir Square in Cairo, "No to Sectarian Strife."

The call follows clashes on Tuesday, killing 10 or 11 people and injuring more than 100, between Coptic Christians and Muslims outside Cairo. Christians were protesting an attack on a church last week when, after they blocked a road, stone-throwing with passers-by turned into violence.

In a statement, the Muslim Brotherhood has blamed remaining members of the ousted regime of President Hosni Mubarak for the violence, "These people are operating under the principle of 'divide to conquer' and have incited a group of Muslim extremists to bring up other sectarian issues, which should not be discussed at present."

The Brotherhood called on Egyptians to listen to the voice of reason and put the interests of the country ahead of their personal or professional interests.

1140 GMT: Members of the European Parliament are calling on the European Union's foreign policy representative, Catherine Ashton, to establish formal relations with Libya's opposition National Transitional Council. A non-binding resolution is expected to be passed in the Parliament tomorrow.

Ashton reportedly met with a Council representative yesterday but, she has said it is up to European member states to decide whether to recognise the TNC.

The Council has called for a no-fly zone to protect the "Free Libya" area in the east, on the condition that the zone is enforced from outside Libya, with no foreign soldiers on Libyan soil.

1135 GMT: AFP is reporting more heavy shelling just west of the opposition-held oil port of Ras Lanuf in north-central Libya. Aircraft have been heard overhead.

1030 GMT: AFP is now reporting 10 killed and 110 injured in Tuesday's clashes during Coptic Christian protests in Egypt.

Al Jazeera English's Ayman Mohyeldin says 11 killed --- six Christians and five Muslims --- and nearly 100 injured.

0930 GMT: In addition to his State TV appearance early this morning (see 0550 GMT), Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi gave interviews to Turkey's TRT television and France's La Chaine Info. The two interviews, however, did not exactly fit together:

To TRT: "If Al Qa'eda manages to seize Libya, then the entire region, up to Israel, will be at the prey of chaos... The international community is now beginning to understand that we have to prevent Osama Bin Laden from taking control of Libya and Africa."

To La Chaine Info H"I cannot fight against my people, that's a lie by colonising countries: France, Britain, the Americans. They have suffered (Osama) Bin Laden's interventions, and now, instead of saying that this is an attack against Bin Laden and instead of supporting Libya, no, they want to re-colonise Libya. But this is a colonialist plot, it's colonialist. If al-Qaeda no longer is a common enemy, then from tomorrow we are going to meet Bin Laden and reach agreement with him. He will become our friend if it is considered that this is not terrorism."

0855 GMT: The Constitutional Democratic Rally, the party that controlled Tunisia from independence in 1956 until the fall of President Ben Ali in January, has been formally dissolved by a court.

0850 GMT: Medical sources in Egypt say six people died and 57 were wounded in Tuesday's clashes (see 0550 GMT).

0845 GMT: An opposition fighter tells Reuters, "Tanks are everywhere" in the opposition-held city of Zawiyah, 55 km (35 miles) west of Tripoli, as regime forces close in on the main square.

0725 GMT: The Financial Times reports, "Coalition Wants Bahrain Monarchy Ousted".

Two Shia parties, Al-Wafa and Haq, and the Bahrain Freedom Movement declared, “The coalition believes that the main demand of the popular revolution is the downfall of the current oppressive regime and the establishment of a democratic republic that expresses the desires of the people and protects its dignity, interests and rights." The groups called for “resistance [to] escalate peacefully using diversified means across the entire lengths of Bahrain”.

0725 GMT: A Yemeni man has died of injuries after Tuesday's attack by security forces on the pro-democracy camp outside Sanaa University. Almost 100 people were wounded by the assault.

There were other demonstrations on Tuesday. In the southern port city of Aden, a protest denounced the shooting of a young protester, critically wounding him, on Monday.

In the Ibb Province, tens of thousands called on the government to bring to justice those responsible for an attack on Sunday which killed one person and wounded 53.

0715 GMT: In Syria, 12 human rights organisations have called on the regime to end the state of emergency, in effect since 1963, which "affects human rights and public freedoms which are the subject of continuous violations....We call for the lifting of the state of emergency and the release of political prisoners."

Signatories of the statement included the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, the Syrian League for the Defence of Human Rights, the National Organisation for Human Rights in Syria and the Kurdish Committee for Human Rights in Syria. They also demanded the "amendment of all laws that prevent human rights organisations from working openly and freely, and civil society from playing its role effectively" and called on the government to "enact a law on political parties to enable citizens to exercise their right to participate in managing the affairs of the country".

The groups also asked for judicial reforms and asked authorities to "urgently take all necessary steps to cancel all forms of discrimination against the Kurdish people" who are 9% of the population.

0550 GMT: After teasing foreign journalists for more than 12 hours with the possibility of a news conference, appearing at their hotel n Tripoli but then walking through the lobby and out a side door, Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi popped up on State TV just after 4:30 a.m. local time (0230 GMT). He declared that "misguided and mad groups" are responsible for the continued violence in the country and that the opposition has been brainwashed by Al Qa'eda.

It was a Tuesday which was dragged out on several fronts. Regime forces maintained their siege of opposition positions in Zawiyah in the west (see separate entry for a striking video report by Alex Crawford of the situation) and in Ras Lanuf in north-central Libya but were still unable to regain control.

The opposition began the day by asserting that they had rejected a deal offered by Qaddafi's representatives, in which the Libyan leader would step down under certain conditions. They continued it by giving Qaddafi 72 hours to step down, a demand which appeared to have more rhetoric than substance behind its enforcement.

The international community drifted in discussion of a no-fly zone over the opposition-held east Libya but seemed to be moving further away from action. US officials such as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton put out the line that no action was possible without a United Nations resolution, which appears to be a distant prospect.

In Yemen, at least 75 people were reportedly injured when security forces fired into thousands of protesters camping outside Sanaa University. The violence followed an incident at a large prison in the capital when demonstrating inmates, shouting anti-Government slogans, were met by tear gas. There were reports of deaths and dozens of injuries.

And in Egypt, there were disturbing signs of conflict in the post-Mubarak era. A Coptic Christian man was killed and 15 were injured as Christians protested Hilwan just outside Cairo over the burning of a church last week. Stones were thrown when bystanders, reported to be Muslims, were angered at the blocking of a road by the demonstrators, and witnesses said the military intervened, firing shots into the air.

In Tahrir Square in Cairo, a march for International Women's Day had a disappointing turnout and took a bad turn when the women were accosted by a group of men chanting insults.