the hands of Gaddafi's troops

A distraught Libyan woman stormed into a Tripoli hotel today to tell foreign reporters that government troops raped her, setting off a brawl when hotel staff and government minders tried to detain her

Iman al-Obeidi was tackled by waitresses and government minders as she sat telling her story to journalists after she rushed into the restaurant at the Rixos hotel

She claimed loudly that troops had detained her a checkpoint, tied her up, abused her, then led her away to be gang raped

Her story could not be independently verified, but the dramatic scene provided a rare first-hand glimpse of the brutal crackdown on public dissent by Gaddafi's regime as the Libyan leader fights a rebellion against his rule that began last month

The regime has been keeping up a drumbeat of propaganda in the Tripoli-centered west of the country under its control even as it faces a week-long international air campaign against the Libyan military

At a hastily arranged press conference after the incident, government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said investigators had told him the woman was drunk and possibly mentally challenged

Before she was dragged out of the hotel, al-Obeidi managed to tell journalists that she was detained by a number of troops at a Tripoli checkpoint on Wednesday

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