EU in Tripoli as rebuild begins
The European Union has opened a humanitarian office in Tripoli and France has reopened its embassy as the process of resurrecting the Libyan capital gets underway.
Kristalina Georgieva, European commissioner for international aid, said EU experts would ensure that assistance in health, medicine, food and drinking water is delivered soon.
Initial findings pointed to a lack of health care provisions and drinking water as the most immediate concerns.
The EU has allocated €10m for emergency humanitarian operations in Tripoli. A total of €4m has been earmarked for the activities of the International Committee of the Red Cross.
France's foreign ministry said it had reopened its embassy as part of a hurried effort to assess needs in Tripoli and around the country after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi.
Ministry spokesman Bernard Valero said on France's RTL radio "there's no time to lose" to help foster reconstruction in Libya, and French diplomats were looking to pick up the pieces of the pillaged embassy.
Paris is preparing to host an international conference on Libya on Thursday, aimed in part at giving support to the rebel Transitional National Council.
France was the first country to recognise the TNC as Libya's government, and sent a diplomatic representation to its headquarters in north-eastern Benghazi.
France has been a major player from the start of Libya's six-month march toward Gaddafi's removal, with Paris hosting numerous diplomatic talks over the crisis and French jets at the centre of the Nato effort.
Meanwhile, Italian oil giant Eni SpA said it had signed a memorandum with Libya's rebels to restart a key pipeline that carries natural gas from the North African nation to Italy.
Eni said both it and the Benghazi-based National Transitional Council - the rebel government - are pushing ahead to create "conditions for a rapid and complete recovery of Eni's activities in Libya" and to restarting the Greenstream pipeline.
Eni also said it will send a cargo of refined fuels and will help assess the state of Libya's oil infrastructure after the six-month civil war.
The Italian firm was the largest foreign producer in Libya before the start of the fighting.
