French war planes pounded Libyan targets this evening, the first foreign strikes enforcing a United Nations "no-fly" zone over Libya, following an emergency international summit in Paris earlier in the day.
A French military spokesman said his forces targeted a vehicle that was threatening civilians in Libya. But news reports say the French fighters also destroyed four Libyan tanks near the eastern rebel stronghold of Benghazi.
French President Nicholas Sarkozy announced today that representatives of the U.N., European Union, Arab League and Western powers had agreed to use all necessary means, including military force, at their Paris summit. Mr. Sarkozy, stressed the fact that the despite the UN-backed intervention, the fight in Libya belonged to the Libyan people.
"If we intervene on the side of Arab people it is not to impose our will on the Libyan people, but because our universal conscience cannot tolerate such crimes," he said, referring to attacks on the civilian population. "We do it to protect the civilian population from the madness of a regime that is killing its own people. They have lost all legitimacy", said Sarkozy.
EU-Digest
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