TRIPOLI (BNO NEWS) -- Ousted Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi was killed on Thursday in a gun battle with revolutionary fighters near his hometown Sirte, the country's prime minister said. Footage of his body was released by several news organizations.

Officials with Libya's transitional government said Gaddafi was shot in his legs and head after troops found his hiding place near Sirte where he was apparently hiding in a hole. Some reports claimed Gaddafi shouted "don't shoot, don't shoot", but few details about the sequence of events were immediately available.

Video footage broadcast by Al Jazeera showed Gaddafi's body with an apparent gunshot wound to the head, and bystanders could be seen kicking the body of the former dictator who ruled the African country from 1969 until earlier this year. Celebrations immediately broke out across Tripoli and in other Libyan cities.

International reaction to the fall of Sirte and the death of Gaddafi, who said in September he would die as a martyr, started to trickle in on Thursday afternoon. "Sic transit gloria mundi (Thus passes the glory of the world). The war has ended now," said Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

European Union (EU) foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said his death brings closure to 'a tragic period' in the lives of many Libyans. "The fall of Sirte marks the end of the Gaddafi era. Libya is now under the full control of National Transitional Council (NTC) forces," she said.

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President José Manuel Barroso also welcomed Gaddafi's death in a joint statement. "The reported death of Muammar Gaddafi marks the end of an era of despotism and repression from which the Libyan people have suffered for too long," the European officials said.

They added: "Today Libya can turn a page in its history and embrace a new democratic future. We call on the National Transitional Council to pursue a broad based reconciliation process which reaches out to all Libyans and enables a democratic, peaceful and transparent transition in the country."

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who is on a visit to Afghanistan, told CBS News that the capture of Gaddafi is a 'significant development.' However, Clinton, who was speaking when reports of Gaddafi's capture or death were still unconfirmed, said she did not expect his capture would end the fighting.