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Qadhafi regime forces have occupied buildings in an abandoned, built-up area of Brega, for use as military compounds. From these, they control their campaign to conduct attacks against the civilian population, threatening Ajdabiya and Benghazi. These command and control nodes have been monitored by NATO with intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets over time, in order to determine and confirm their exact location. Once assessed as clear military targets, precision-guided munitions were employed to end the use of this abandoned civilian neighbourhood as a command and control hub to direct attacks against civilians.
“This continues to show Qadhafi’s reprehensible tactics of placing military assets and operations at the heart of civilian neighbourhoods,” said Lieutenant General Charles Bouchard, Commander of Operation UNIFIED PROTECTOR. "We have meticulously monitored these developments for a significant period and it was time to remove this threat."
NATO continues to take all necessary measures to protect civilians from attack, or threat of attack, as authorized by UNSCR 1973. NATO will continue operations until all attacks and threats of attack against civilians and civilian-populated areas have ended; the regime has verifiably withdrawn to bases all military forces; and until there is full, safe and unhindered humanitarian access to all the people in Libya in need of assistance.
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