LIBYAN fighters have overrun the remaining positions of Muammar Gaddafi loyalists in his hometown of Sirte, ending the last major resistance by former regime supporters still holding out two months after the fall of the capital Tripoli. Reporters at the scene watched as the final assault began around 8am local time today and ended about 90 minutes later.
Just before the assault, about five carloads of loyalists tried to flee the enclave down the coastal highway but were met by gunfire from the revolutionaries, who killed at least 20 of them.
"Our forces control the last neighbourhood in Sirte," Hassan Draoua, a member of Libya's interim National Transitional Council, told The Associated Press in Tripoli.
"The city has been liberated."
After the battle, revolutionaries began searching homes and buildings, looking for any Gaddafi fighters who might be hiding there.
At least 16 pro-Gaddafi fighters were captured, along with multiple cases of ammunition and trucks loaded with weapons. Reporters saw revolutionaries beating captured Gaddafi men in the back of trucks and officers intervening to stop them.