Eight rebels killed in attack on Libyan oil pumping station

Tripoli, Libya (CNN) -- Loyalists to Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi killed eight rebel fighters in a rare attack earlier this week in an opposition-held region near the Egyptian border, a medical official and an opposition spokesman told CNN Saturday.
The regime loyalists, riding in a convoy of nine vehicles, attacked an oil pumping station in the Libyan desert on Thursday, about 300 kilometers (186 miles) southwest of Tobruk, said Dr. Rida Benfayed, a physician who claimed he treated a rebel fighter injured in the attack.
Tobruk is a rebel stronghold one hour east of the Egyptian border, and site of a key oil exporting facility where the rebels shipped out their first consignment of oil earlier this month.
Benfayed said the gunmen opened fire on a team of nine rebel military guards manning the pumping station. The regime loyalists set a tire on fire to burn the remains of a senior rebel guard, the doctor said.

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The only guard who survived was shot twice in the leg but managed to escape and drive himself to Tobruk where he's in stable condition at a hospital.
Opposition spokesman Ahmed Bani confirmed the attack, which showed the regime's capability to strike deep into rebel territory with ambush-style attacks.
"He (Gadhafi) doesn't want us to sell the oil," Bani said. "This is a lesson for us. We will take measures to increase security along the pipelines."

Bani said the pumping station sustained damage in the attack, though the extent wasn't immediately clear.

curtsy-CNN