The US ambassador to Libya and three other embassy staff were killed in Tuesday's attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, it has been confirmed.
They died as an armed mob protesting over a film they say insults the Prophet Mohammed stormed the US consulate. It is not clear if US ambassador Christopher Stevens, 52, was killed in his car or the compound.
US President Barack Obama said he "strongly condemned" the "outrageous" attack.
"While the US rejects efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others, we must all unequivocally oppose the kind of senseless violence that took the lives of these public servants," he said.
Libya's deputy prime minister Mustafa Abu Shagur also condemned the "cowardly" attack in a Twitter message.
Gunmen attacked the compound on Tuesday evening, clashing with Libyan security forces before the latter withdrew as they came under heavy fire.
Reporters on the scene said they could see looters raiding the building, walking off with desks, chairs and washing machines.
It followed an attack in the Egyptian capital Cairo, when protesters climbed the walls of the US embassy and tore down the American flag and burned it.
The protests were sparked by outrage over a video being promoted on YouTube by extreme anti-Muslim groups in the US.
Demonstrators say the \$5m film, called The Innocence Of Muslims, insults the Prophet Mohammed. It apparently depicts him as a fraud, showing him having sex and calling for massacres.
Sky's Defence and Security Editor Sam Kiley said the attack was a "violent and systematic" reaction to the film which he described as an "amateurish production".
"I have watched 15 minutes of it. It is contemptible, idiotic and very crude, and deliberately rude about the Prophet Mohammed. It was deliberately intended to inflame exactly the sort of reaction that has come now," he said.
"The tragedy is of course is that it's been successful. There are groups out in the Muslim world that rather than ignore this with the contempt that it is due, in my view, have been inflamed by it, or rumours of it."
Sam Bacile, the man behind the film, went into hiding on Tuesday. The 56-year-old property developer, who identifies himself as an Israeli Jew, said he produced, directed and wrote the two-hour film.
Speaking by phone to the Associated Press from an undisclosed location, he remained defiant, saying Islam is a "cancer". He said he hoped his film would provoke reaction and expose Islam's flaws to the world.
Earlier, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she had called the Libyan government to coordinate more protection for Americans in the country.
Libyan officials said it remained unclear whether the two protests in Benghazi and Cairo had been coordinated.
Benghazi was the launch-pad of last year's revolution which overthrew Colonel Gaddafi and is a seat of Islamist politics in Libya.
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