Allies Defending Actions in Libya After Airstrike

The airstrikes on Saturday night killed a son and three grandchildren of Colonel Qaddafi, according to the government, which accused the NATO coalition powers of “a direct operation to assassinate the leader of this country” in violation of international law. Qaddafi supporters in Tripoli burned or vandalized the closed American, British and Italian embassies and ransacked United Nations buildings, forcing the evacuation of the 12 remaining international staff members. And Colonel Qaddafi’s military showed no sign of restraint after the airstrikes, shelling rebel positions in the besieged port city of Misurata and elsewhere.

Russia, a permanent member of the Security Council, said the NATO attack aroused “serious doubts about coalition members’ statement that the strikes in Libya do not have the goal of physically annihilating Mr. Qaddafi and members of his family.”

While the Obama administration had no comment about the airstrikes, it criticized the Libyans’ attacks on the embassies in Tripoli. Mark Toner, a State Department spokesman, condemned the retaliation “in the strongest possible terms.”

The United Nations’ secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, also did not comment on the airstrikes, which were authorized under a Security Council resolution to prevent Colonel Qaddafi’s military from killing civilians in Libya’s two-month-old civil war.