Fresh Attacks Kill One in Libya's Benghazi

A Libyan soldier was shot dead and a civilian wounded by a bomb under his car in separate attacks in the eastern city of Benghazi on Tuesday, medics and security sources said.

"A soldier from the Libyan army was killed and a civilian was seriously wounded," a security source said.

The soldier belonged to the Saiqa special forces unit and was shot five times by unknown attackers

Later, the 23-year-old son of a senior navy officer was seriously wounded by a bomb placed underneath his car in the city center.

The victim's father, Commander Rafaa al-Awami is in Russia for training and had recently received threats, a security source said, without elaborating.

Surgeons had to amputate the young man's foot, said Fadia al-Barghathi, spokeswoman for the city's Al-Jala hospital.

In Ajdabiya, south of Benghazi, security forces defused an explosive device attached to the car of a woman said to have been linked to the regime of the late dictator Moammar Gadhafi, a local source told AFP.

Benghazi, cradle of the 2011 uprising that toppled Gadhafi, has been caught in spiraling violence since his fall.

A special forces soldier who had been acting as imam at a barracks in the city was wounded on Monday when gunmen opened fire on him, a member of his unit said.

Militants in the city have targeted judges, members of the security forces, local government officials and journalists in recent months.

The latest attacks came on the day Libya was due to mark the 62nd anniversary of its independence.

But authorities have postponed celebrations for a period of official mourning after a suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into a security checkpoint outside Benghazi on Sunday, killing 13 people.