seventh day of air strikes against the Libyan regime’s forces on Friday as Western powers battled to find a way to hand control of the campaign to NATO.

Coalition forces carried out a seventh day of air strikes against the Libyan regime’s forces on Friday as Western powers battled to find a way to hand control of the campaign to NATO.

France insisted on keeping the 28-member alliance out of decision-making with President Nicolas Sarkozy holding out hopes of a diplomatic initiative to end the conflict.

Britain and France were jointly preparing a “political and diplomatic” solution, he said.

Coalition warplanes meanwhile pounded Colonel Moamer Gaddafi’s forces in the strategic eastern town of Ajdabiya, boosting rebel efforts to launch new offensives, journalists reported.

Plumes of smoke filled the sky as the pace of air strikes escalated. Terrified residents were fleeing the city, 160 kilometres south of the rebel stronghold of Benghazi.

Anti-aircraft fire raked the Libyan skies overnight, with at least three explosions shaking the capital Tripoli and the eastern suburb of Tajura.

At least one blast was heard from the centre of the city, while others came from Tajura, home to military bases, a journalist reported. US warships and submarines had fired 16 new Tomahawk cruise missiles at Libyan targets in the 24 hours to 0500 GMT Friday, the Pentagon said, adding that coalition warplanes carried out 153 sorties over the same period. The total number of Tomahawks launched at Libya rose to at least 170.

Libyan state television said “civilian and military sites in Tripoli and Tajura” had come under fire from “long-range missiles”. In the streets of Tajura, where several military bases are situated, a thick pall of smoke rose into the sky after a seventh day of bombing, and the streets were practically deserted despite Friday prayers, although hooded, armed men stood guard at the main junctions.

A French fighter jet destroyed an artillery battery overnight outside Ajdabiya, at least part of which was still in rebel hands.

Rebels fighting to retake the town, which sits at a junction on roads leading from rebel strongholds Benghazi and Tobruk, were being held off by loyalist-armoured vehicles.

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