Emotional Clinton denies Benghazi cover-up

US: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton came out guns blazing Wednesday, angrily dismissing Republican charges of a cover-up over the deadly Benghazi attack and warning of a rise in militant extremism.

At times emotional and often fiery, Clinton gave no ground to congressional critics still seeking to determine why the administration at first blamed the September 11 attack on a protest outside the US mission in eastern Libya.

"With all due respect, the fact is, we had four dead Americans. Was it because of a protest or because of guys out for a walk one night and (who) decided to go kill some Americans?" she told the tense hearing.

"What difference does it make?" she demanded, thumping her fist on the table as Senator Ron Johnson repeatedly asked her why the administration had falsely initially linked the attack to protests against an anti-Islam Internet video. "It is our job to figure out what happened and do everything we can to prevent it from ever happening again, senator," she said.

She insisted there was no administration cover-up of the events of the night, when dozens of heavily-armed Al-Qaeda-linked militants overran the compound and a nearby CIA-run annex, setting off an eight-hour firefight in which four people, including US ambassador Chris Stevens, were killed. "Nothing could be further from the truth," Clinton insisted, stressing that in the days afterwards the administration did not have "a clear picture yet." In one of her last major appearances before stepping down at the end of the month, Clinton showed no signs of the ill-health which plagued her in December.

She also choked back a sob as she described having to call the families with the news that Stevens, and information manager Sean Smith, had been killed.

AFP