France said yesterday it had air dropped arms to Libyan rebels in mountains south of Tripoli who are eyeing an assault on the capital, a day after anti-regime forces captured a network of weapons caches.

But the increasingly emboldened rebels suffered a deadly assault from Gaddafi forces in the third-largest city Misurata, where rockets killed one civilian and wounded six late Tuesday, residents said.

In London, meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said yesterday the cash-strapped rebels had received the first €70 million from a fund set up by international donors.

France’s Le Figaro daily said yesterday it had seen a secret intelligence memo and talked to well-placed officials, saying air drops were designed to help rebels encircle Tripoli and encourage a popular revolt in the city itself. It said the arms were dropped in the Nafusa mountains region, where Berber tribes have risen to join the revolt against Colonel Gaddafi’s four-decade rule and seized several towns.

The crates contained assault rifles, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, it said, and also European-made Milan anti-tank missiles, a powerful addition to the rebel arsenal that can destroy a tank or a bunker.

“If the rebels can get to the outskirts of Tripoli, the capital will take the chance to rise against Gaddafi,” said an official quoted in the report.

Colonel Thierry Burkhard, spokesman for the French general staff, later said the shipments were essentially light arms such as assault rifles to help civilian communities protect themselves from regime troops. He said France had become aware in early June that rebel-held Berber villages in the Nafusa mountains region had come under pressure from Gaddafi loyalist forces.