"Three people died -- two of them are journalists and one was their guide who was helping them film a documentary," Mussa Ibrahim told a news conference in the Bab al-Aziziya compound that was held next to a large, water-filled crater.

He identified the dead journalists as Ali al-Graw and Ismail al-Sharif and said they were filming "hundreds of people who were celebrating their resilience against NATO".

He said Graw was a Libyan journalist and film-maker, but did not provide further details on Sharif, or specify for which news organisation the two worked.

He identified their guide as Abdel Salam Massoud Mohammed, 25, and said that "in addition to these three martyrs, we have 27 injured people" from various strikes.

Earlier, two regime minders accompanying journalists on a trip to the compound had said that six people were killed and 10 wounded.

Ibrahim said three killed and 27 wounded was the official toll.

He added late on Thursday that the night before the Bab al-Aziziya strike, "four bodies were found, so four people were killed" in an air strike he said hit a company on the airport road that "used to be a military location in the '80s."

This, he said, may have contributed to confusion over the Bab al-Aziziya death toll. The seven bodies were buried on Thursday.

At the compound, the minders first took journalists to a water-filled crater in a street and then to a destroyed building which they said had housed government offices.

The group was then taken to the much-larger crater next to which Ibrahim gave the press conference.

He said the strike, which appeared to have been by a "bunker-buster" bomb, which penetrates underground and then explodes, had hit a "sewage location".

Journalists were blocked from inspecting a nearby staircase leading underground, which was surrounded by regime supporters.

The strike came hours after Libyan state television broadcast footage of Kadhafi in a meeting.

It was Kadhafi's first on-camera appearance since the regime said his youngest son, Seif al-Arab, and three of his grandchildren, were killed by a NATO strike it slammed as "a direct operation to assassinate" the veteran leader.

earlier related report
Rebels predict Kadhafi fall as compound hit
Tripoli (AFP) May 12, 2011 - NATO-led air strikes hit Moamer Kadhafi's compound on Thursday and killed three people, the Libyan regime said, as rebels said they expect the strongman's regime to crumble in the "next few weeks."

The pre-dawn strikes in Tripoli came just hours after state television showed footage of what it said was Kadhafi meeting tribal leaders, the first video of him aired since an April 30 air strike that his government said was an attempt on his life.

"Three people died -- two of them are journalists and one was their guide who was helping them film a documentary," government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim told journalists in the Bab al-Aziziya compound, held next to a large, water-filled crater.

He identified the journalists as Ali al-Graw and Ismail al-Sharif and said they had been filming "hundreds of people who were celebrating their resilience against NATO."

He identified the guide as Abdel Salam Massoud Mohammed, 25, and said that "in addition to these three martyrs, we have 27 injured people" from various strikes.

The strike was apparently by a "bunker-buster" bomb, which penetrates underground and then explodes and which hit a "sewage location," Ibrahim said.

Late on Wednesday, state television had shown footage of what it said was a meeting between Kadhafi and tribal dignitaries from the rebel-held east.

A Libyan official told AFP the video was shot at around 7:30 pm (1730 GMT).

It was the first fresh footage of Kadhafi since an air strike killed his son Seif al-Arab and three of his grandchildren, in what the government described as "a direct operation to assassinate the leader of this country."

NATO spokesmen have repeatedly insisted that they are not targetting individual leaders of the Libyan government, but only targeted the capacity to harm civilians.

In Washington, the "premier" of the rebel National Transitional Council predicted the imminent demise of the regime and renewed a plea for US aid.

Mahmud Jibril said "either an internal crackdown will take place or a total collapse of the regime will materialise in the next few weeks, hopefully."

Speaking at the Brookings Institution, he made a fresh appeal for US financial aid to allow for a transition after an eventual departure of Kadhafi.

"We are facing a very acute financial problem because of the frozen assets we have in different European countries and in the United States," said Jibril, who is due to meet a top aide to President Barack Obama on Friday.

"I'd like to seize this opportunity to call on the United States administration to help us ... We are running almost out of money."

Jibril acknowledged that the release of funds is complex because "we are not recognised by the United States."

For his part, State Department spokesman Mark Toner said Washington was working to find ways to assist those fighting the Libyan regime.

"Everyone understands that there's an urgency to this," he said.

Meanwhile, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said the air war in Libya has cost the United States roughly $750 million (525 million euros) to date, more than the Pentagon's initial estimate of $604 million.

Senior rebel leader Mustafa Abdul Jalil held talks in London with British Prime Minister David Cameron, buoyed by the insurgents' capture of Misrata airport on Wednesday, which gave them full control of Libya's third city and their only significant stronghold in the west.

Abdul Jalil told a news conference that Kadhafi was a "legitimate target" for NATO forces as commander-in-chief of the government's armed forces, and appealed for more weapons for the rebels.

Cameron invited the NTC to open an office in London, which would be their first foreign mission.

In addition, he said "we are now completing plans to transfer several million pounds worth of equipment to the police in Benghazi. We will also provide new support to improve the council's public broadcasting capacities.

"These steps signal our very clear intent to work with you and your colleagues to ensure that Libya has a safe and stable future, free from the tyranny of the Kadhafi regime," he added.

Britain has not extended full diplomatic recognition to the rebels as its European partners France and Italy have done, along with Gambia and Qatar.

"The UK recognises states not governments," a Foreign Office spokesman told AFP.

Salah Badi, who commanded the rebel assault on the airport, said rebel positions were now only 10 kilometres (six miles) from Zliten, the next main centre on the 215-kilometre (133 mile) coastal road from Misrata to Tripoli.

In other developments, the French government said a Frenchman was shot and fatally wounded in the rebel stronghold of Benghazi and that four others had been arrested by police in the same incident.

"One of them was wounded by a bullet and died overnight in a hospital in Benghazi" while the other four remain in detention, foreign ministry spokesman Bernard Valero added.

Valero did not say whether the man was shot by police or someone else, and there was no information on the reason for the arrests or what led to the shooting.

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