At least 36 people were killed in Libya’s eastern city of Benghazi, many of them civilian, where Libyan special forces and Islamist militants clashed on Saturday night and yesterday morning, medical and security sources said.

The government said more than 150 people have died in the capital Tripoli and Benghazi in two weeks of fighting as clashes forced US and foreign diplomats to pull out of the country.

Since the clashes erupted a fortnight ago, 94 people have died in the capital, and more than 400 have been injured as militias exchanged rocket and artillery fire across southern Tripoli, the health ministry said. Another 55 people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Benghazi since the clashes have intensified over the last week between regular forces and Islamist militants who are entrenched in the city.

In the last two weeks, Libya has descended into its deadliest violence since the 2011 war that ousted Muammar Gadafy, with the central government unable to impose order. The United States, the United Nations and Turkey have pulled their diplomats out of the country. The US evacuated its embassy on Saturday, driving diplomats across the border into Tunisia under heavy military protection because of Tripoli clashes near the embassy compound.

A British embassy convoy was hit by gunfire during an attempted hijacking outside Tripoli on the way to the Tunisian border, but no one was injured in the incident, an embassy official said. – (Reuters)