Fighting erupts on the outskirts of Misrata, witness says

(CNN) -- Conflict rippled across the outskirts of battle-scarred Misrata Tuesday, and Libyan government forces launched strikes on the besieged city, a witness told CNN.
The witness reported street fighting and confrontations between pro- and anti-government forces in the suburbs and said the pro-Gadhafi strikes came miles away from the city.
However, the witness said, the city center is calm. There's no street-to-street fighting in the urban cauldron and Tripoli Street, the city's main boulevard, is clear, the witness said.
Misrata has been the scene of some of the deadliest battles of the war as rebels attempt to oust Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, who has been in power for more than four decades.
Hundreds of people have been killed in the battle for the city, which has been under siege by Gadhafi's forces for seven weeks. Its population of about 450,000 makes it the country's third-largest city.
"As fighting continues to rage in Misrata, the families recently evacuated by boats to Tobruk from the embattled city describe a catastrophic situation with many having lived in fear of indiscriminate shelling. Many houses and buildings have been destroyed and some families had to move several times," the U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday.
The U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees said parts of the city have lacked electricity and water and people have been hiding in their homes for two months "before seizing the opportunity of a lull in fighting to get to the harbour and board a boat."
"Sniper fire, street clashes and shelling have prevented people from venturing outside of their homes to get food and medicine," the agency said.
"In some neighborhoods in Misrata, pregnant women gave birth in their homes as it would have been too dangerous to make the trip to the hospital."
The U.N. refugee agency also said about 30,000 Libyan civilians have fled the fighting to Tunisia from their homes in the western mountain region in recent weeks.
NATO is leading an international military operation in Libya that includes airstrikes targeting Gadhafi's military resources. It is operating under a U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing all means necessary to protect civilians.
British Foreign Secretary William Hague, briefing the House of Commons on NATO's operation in Libya, said "the case for action remains compelling" and that Gadhafi has shown "he has no regard for civilian lives."
"By his actions it is clear that Gadhafi has no intention of observing the conditions in Security Council resolution 1973 that I described to the House earlier this month," Hague said. "He has repeatedly ignored the cease-fires that he himself has announced. Our military action is defined by the U.N. Security Council resolutions. We are also clear that Gadhafi should go and it is impossible to see a viable or peaceful way forward for Libya until he does so."
He said diplomatic, economic, and military pressure against the Gadhafi regime has been successful. He said military action has "seriously degraded" Gadhafi forces and they remain unable to enter Benghazi, where the opposition is based.

Hague said he is looking forward to the report from the International Criminal Court on crimes against humanity by the Gadhafi regime, and he said there will be another meeting of the international Contact Group on Libya May 5 in Rome.

source:ALJAZEERA