Libya threatens to bomb North-Korean vessel over oil shipment

Libya has threatened to bomb a North Korean-flagged tanker if it tries to ship oil from a rebel-controlled port, in a serious escalation of a standoff over the country's oil wealth.

""The tanker will be bombed if it doesn't follow orders when leaving [the port]. This will be an environmental disaster," Libya prime minister Ali Zeidan warned.

Zeidan denounced the attempt to load oil as a criminal act, while authorities have issued an arrest warrant for the tanker's crew.

Rebels have seized three major Libyan ports since August to press their demands for more autonomy. They have warned Tripoli against staging an attack to halt the oil sale after the tanker docked at Es Sider terminal, one of the country's biggest.

The government is struggling to control militias that helped topple Muammar Gaddafi in 2011 but kept their weapons and now challenge state authority.

A local television station controlled by protesters showed footage of pro-autonomy rebels holding a lengthy ceremony and slaughtering a camel to celebrate their first oil shipment. In the distance stood a tanker.

There was no immediate sign of the country's armed forces moving toward the port. Analysts say the military, still in training, would struggle to overcome rebels battle-hardened from the eight-month uprising against Gaddafi.

Zeidan acknowledged the army had failed to implement his orders last week to stop the protesters sending reinforcements from their base in Ajdabiyah, west of the regional capital Benghazi, to Es Sider.

Abb-Rabbo Albarassi, the eastern autonomy movement's self-declared prime minister, said Zeidan's government had failed to meet its demands to share oil wealth, to investigate oil corruption and to grant regional autonomy.

"We tried to reach a deal with the government, but they and parliament ... were too busy with themselves and didn't even discuss our demands," he said at the televised ceremony. "If anyone attacks, we will respond to that."

A successful independent oil shipment would be a blow to the government. Tripoli had said earlier it would destroy tankers trying to buy oil from Ibrahim Jathran, a former anti-Gaddafi rebel who seized the port and two others with thousands of his men in August.

The North Korean-flagged Morning Glory, which was previously flagged in Liberia, had been circling off the Libyan coast for days. It tried to dock at Es Sider on Tuesday, when port workers still loyal to the central government told the crew to turn back.