20110513
REUTERS

Italy said on Friday Muammar Gaddafi has very likely left the Libyan capital and probably been wounded by NATO air strikes, a report that Tripoli immediately dismissed as "nonsense".

Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini said he heard the report on Gaddafi from the bishop of Tripoli, Giovanni Innocenzo Martinelli.

"I tend to give credence to the comment of the bishop of Tripoli, Monsignor Martinelli, who has been in close contact over recent weeks, when he told us that Gaddafi is very probably outside Tripoli and is probably also wounded. We don't know where or how," Frattini said.

NATO allies including the United States, Britain and France are bombing Libya as part of a U.N. mandate to protect civilians and they say they will not stop until the Libyan leader's 41-year rule ends.

Gaddafi faces a three-month-old uprising by rebels who control Benghazi and the oil-producing east of the country.

The government accuses the rebels of being armed criminals and supporters of al Qaeda and says NATO air strikes are an act of colonial aggression.

There was no independent confirmation of Frattini's report. The Libyan government poured scorn on it.

"It's nonsense," Libyan government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim said in Tripoli. "The leader is in high morale. He's in good spirits. He is leading the country day by day. He hasn't been harmed at all."