Libyan rebels, forced back by air strikes and shelling from loyalist forces, got Arab League backing in their quest for a no-fly zone to ground Moamer Kadhafi's warplanes.

Libyan rebels, forced back by air strikes and shelling from loyalist forces, got Arab League backing in their quest for a no-fly zone to ground Moamer Kadhafi's warplanes.

Forced to abandon efforts to recapture the oil town of Ras Lanuf, the outgunned anti-regime fighters struggled to set up a new defensive line 30 kilometres (about 20 miles) further east along a coastal road towards Brega.

Brega is the last main town before Ajdabiya, gateway to eastern Libya on the roads to the main rebel cities of Benghazi and Tobruk.

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The news was better from the Arab League talks in Cairo however, as it came out in support of plans to impose a no-fly zone over Libya.

The 22-member organisation also decided to make contact with the rebels' provisional national council, in moves welcomed by the United States and Britain.

Arab foreign ministers urged the UN Security Council "to assume its responsibilities in the face of the deteriorating situation in Libya and take the necessary measures to impose an air exclusion zone for Libyan warplanes."