Humanitarian crisis as 180K flee Libya violence

Violence and chaos in Libya have triggered an exodus of more than 180,000 refugees to Tunisia and Egypt, a U.N. official said, as aid workers warned the situation at the Tunisian border has reached crisis point.

France and Britain said Wednesday they will airlift and ferry some of the thousands of Egyptian refugees stranded at the border between Libya and Tunisia.

Egypt launched emergency airlifts and sent ships to handle the chaotic exodus. U.N. refugee agency spokeswoman Melissa Fleming told The Associated Press that 77,320 people have crossed from Libya into Egypt, the vast majority of them Egyptians, and a similar number have crossed from Libya into Tunisia - with about 30,000 more waiting at that border.

The French Foreign Ministry says their operation will involve large airliners and a French Navy ship heading to the region. It says the operation will allow the evacuation of at least 5,000 people over the course of a week. It said that the operation is being carried out in coordination with the European Union.

British Prime Minister David Cameron announced Wednesday that UK will also be sending aircrafts to pick up the stranded Egyptians, who are fleeing chaos and violence in Libya.

Complete Coverage: Anger in the Arab World

Officials say the situation has been made even more volatile by humanitarian aid workers being blocked from reaching western Libya, patients reportedly being executed in hospitals, or shot by gunmen hiding in ambulances.

Flemming said Muammar Qaddafi's forces appear to be targeting Egyptians and Tunisians, apparently because he believes they are the main trigger of the uprising against his regime.

"(There are) many, many terrified refugees" in the Libyan capital Tripoli who are too afraid to move for fear they will be killed, Fleming told AP.

Some Somali and Eritreans workers around Benghazi, Libya's second largest city which is now under the control of opposition forces, are also feeling "hunted" as they are being mistaken for mercenaries hired by Gadhafi, she said.

Libyan troops, rebels battle for key oil town

At the Libya-Tunisian border -- where authorities say up to 75,000 people have gathered in just nine days -- "the situation is reaching crisis point," Fleming warned.

She said 14,000 people fled to Tunisia on Monday and another 15,000 are expected to flee Tuesday.

The U.N. is setting up enough tents to hold 12,000 people and plans two more airlifts Thursday to bring in tents and supplies for 10,000 more, but water supplies are "precarious," she warned.

Italy said late Tuesday after an emergency meeting on the Libya crisis that it will send a humanitarian mission to the Tunisian border to assist some 10,000 refugees.

The Egyptian military sent two ships to Tunisia to bring back stranded Egyptians who fled from Libya. Egyptian Ambassador Mohamed Abdel-Hakam said more than 103,000 Egyptians home have returned from Libya either through the airports or by land since the political situation deteriorated in Libya, and another 20,000 foreigners have fled to Egypt from Libya.

Thousands of Vietnamese and Bangladeshis at the Libyan side of the border with Tunisia are "in urgent need of food, water and shelter," said Jemini Pandya, a spokeswoman for the International Organization for Migration. Nepalese, Ghanaians and Nigerians are also sleeping unprotected at the borders, she added.

"With thousands of migrants still awaiting authorization to enter Tunisia, there is an urgent need to decongest the border area which lacks adequate facilities to host large numbers of people," IOM's Tunisia mission chief Marc Petzold said.

"The majority of the people coming across the border are young Tunisian and Egyptian men who were working in Libya. Tens of thousands are coming every day," she said.

Her agency said it launched a $38.7 million emergency operation to bring food to 2.7 million people in Libya, Egypt and Tunisia over the next three months. The first airlift of 80 metric tons of high energy biscuits arrived Monday, while shipments of wheat and wheat flour were being sent to the Tunisian border and to the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi.

Spanish Prime minister Jose Luis Zapatero, visiting Tunisia on Wednesday, told reporters that Spain has already sent a plane with 30 tons of humanitarian aid to the Libyan-Tunisian border and has another plane available.

"We can also make ships available and the foreign ministry is coordinating this with the Tunisian government," Zapatero told reporters.

He said Spain is willing to commit to a $414 million credit line over the next three years to help economic recovery in Tunisia and other North African countries through the EU's European Investment Bank.

France, too, announced an airlift and naval operation coordinated with the European Union. Large airliners and a French Navy ship were heading to the region to evacuate at least 5,000 Egyptian refugees.

The 57-nation Organization of The Islamic Conference said it would set up two field hospitals and provide ambulances on the Tunisian and Egyptian borders with Libya. It also planned to provide temporary shelters for 10,000 people and hand out flour, sugar, rice, canned food and infant formula.

The International Organization for Migration said it had evacuated 3,850 people from Tunisia by air and sea.

"Every few minutes we learn about more and more groups of migrants either stranded inside Libya or those who arrive at its borders with Egypt, Tunisia and Niger," said the group's operations director, Mohammed Abdiker. "The scale of this crisis cannot be underestimated."

His organization said thousands of people inside Libya were also preparing to move to Niger as food prices skyrocket and supplies run out, and that two Africans were killed Monday when they left their home to search for food.

Among those stranded at the Tunisian border were Bangladeshi, Vietnamese, Filipinos and Ghanaians, and 2,400 more Africans at Tumo on the Libyan side of the border with Niger. A group of 1,150 Nigerians left already after getting help from U.N. agencies in Dirkou, Niger, but another 4,000 people, mostly Nigerians, were stranded around the Libyan coastal city of Misrata.

Pope Benedict XVI got a private briefing Wednesday on the refugee crisis from U.N. World Food Program Director Josette Sheeran, who had just visited the Libyan-Tunisian border.

"It was clear to me as I saw these desperate people pour across the border - more than 2,000 an hour - that the world must act - and must act quickly - to prevent a major humanitarian disaster," Sheeran said. "Cutting off food supplies must not be used as a weapon."

The international charity Save the Children estimated that 1 million children in western Libya were in harm's way as Qaddafi's forces fight protesters for control of key towns and cities, including the capital, Tripoli.