TRIPOLI, June 19: Libya’s government said Nato warplanes struck a residential neighbourhood in the capital on Sunday and killed nine civilians, including two children, adding to its accusations that the alliance is striking non-military targets.

Nato acknowledged its planes hit targets in Tripoli in the early hours of Sunday and said it was investigating whether it was responsible for the alleged strike on a heavily damaged building.

Whether the airstrikes are eventually confirmed or not, the allegations provided supporters of Muammar Qadhafi’s regime a new rallying point against the international intervention in Libya’s civil war. The foreign minister called for a “global jihad” on the West in response.

Early in the morning, journalists based in the Libyan capital were rushed by government officials to the damaged building, which appeared to have been partially under construction. Reporters were escorted back to the site during the day, where children’s toys, teacups and dust-covered mattresses could be seen amid the rubble.

It was not possible to independently verify the government’s account of what happened. Nato has repeatedly insisted it tries to avoid killing civilians.

Foreign Minister Abdul-Ati al-Obeidi told reporters nine civilians, including two children, were killed in the explosion and said 18 people were wounded. He said the strike was a “deliberate attack on a civilian neighbourhood,” and follows other alleged targeting of non-military targets such as a hotel, oxygen factory and civilian vehicles.

“The deliberate bombing ... is a direct call for all free peoples of the world and for all Muslims to initiate a global jihad against the oppressive, criminal West and never to allow such criminal organisations as Nato to decide the future of other independent and sovereign nations,” al-Obeidi said. He did not take questions.

Journalists were shown the bodies of at least four people said to have been killed in the strike, including the two young children. Foreign reporters in Tripoli are not allowed to travel and report freely and are almost always shadowed by government minders.

Salem Ali Garadi, 51, who said his brother and sister were among the victims, said five people were killed. There was no explanation for the discrepancy in death counts.

Before Sunday’s alleged strike, Libya’s Health Ministry said 856 civilians had been killed in Nato air attacks since they began in March. The figure could not be independently confirmed. Previous government tolls from individual strikes have proven to be exaggerated.Nato acknowledged its planes hit targets in Tripoli and was looking into the reports.

“Nato confirms that it was operating in Tripoli last night, conducting airstrikes against a legitimate military target,” Wing commander Mike Bracken said in a statement on Sunday afternoon.

“Nato deeply regrets any civilian loss of life during this operation and would be very sorry if the review of this incident concluded it to be a Nato weapon,” Bracken said.

A later Nato statement said the incident “is said to have occurred ... following a deliberate strike which targeted a missile site operated by pro- Qadhafi forces.”

The alliance struck Tripoli again on Sunday afternoon. A number of explosions could be heard in the city, and smoke could be seen rising over the southern part of the capital.

While Nato warplanes have stepped up their campaign against Qadhafi’s regime over the past week, fighting has intensified between rebels and government troops outside the port city of Misrata, the main rebel stronghold in western Libya.

For weeks, the rebels had been bottled up in the city, some 125 miles east of Tripoli. The eastern third of the country is under rebel control from their de facto capital, Benghazi.

On Sunday, Qadhafi’s forces unleashed a heavy barrage of Grad rockets and mortars on the rebel front lines in Dafniya, about 15 miles west of Misrata. A medical official in Misrata hospital said that 10 rebels were killed and 54 wounded in clashes on Sunday in Dafniya.

As the barrage continued into the afternoon, a steady stream of pickup trucks rushed casualties to a field hospital in Dafniya, where medics and volunteers quickly unloaded the dead from the back of the pickups and placed the wounded on stretchers.

One truck pulled up with three bodies covered in blood.

“They are shelling us really badly today with everything _ mortars, Grads, heat-seeking weapons, anything you can imagine,” said Mustafa, 30, who was helping drive the wounded from the front.—AP