western countries urge citizens to leave as civil war intensifies: Libya

Fighters from the Misrata brigade fire at Tripoli airport on Saturday amid turmoil in the Libyan capital. Photograph: AP

Western countries urged their citizens to leave #Libya yesterday, as the country descended further into civil war and British diplomats came under fire.

As fighting raged across the country leaving 59 dead, Britain warned against travel to Libya, and told those already there to leave. "British nationals in Libya should leave now by commercial means," the Foreign Office said. Britain's embassy would remain open but with reduced staff.

France, Germany and the Netherlands issued similar warnings. "The situation is extremely unpredictable and uncertain," the German foreign ministry said. "German nationals are at increased risk of kidnapping and attacks."

Earlier on Sunday, a vehicle carrying a British diplomat was ambushed and sprayed with gunfire on the outskirts of Tripoli.

The armoured vehicle was evacuating British diplomats to neighbouring Tunisia and was attacked close to Camp 27, the base of an Islamist militia on the western outskirts.

Gunmen fired four rounds, all of them stopped by bullet-proof glass, and the vehicle, a white 4x4 with red diplomatic plates, was able to speed away. Ambassador Michael Aron later tweeted: "Shots were fired at our vehicles but all staff safe."

British security officers then warned a second convoy that was evacuating EU staff on the same coastal highway and it turned back, some of the staff later leaving Tripoli on an Italian air force transport plane.

On Saturday, the United States embassy had evacuated staff in the early hours of morning along the same road, with US jets orbiting above ready to strike militia. The decision had been taken after consultations with Washington. Memories are still fresh of the fate of the last ambassador, Chris Stevens, who died along with three staff when the US consulate in Benghazi was stormed by a militia two years ago.

With the American exit, the international community has more or less given up on a diplomatic solution. The Italian air force said it stood ready for more airlifts but EU ambassadors holding a crisis meeting on Sunday said no final decision on a total pullout had been reached.

Such an evacuation would be a severe loss of face, particularly for London and Paris, which led the Nato bombing of Gaddafi three years go and proclaimed at the time they had delivered democracy to Libya.

At Mitiga airport on Sunday waiting for the Italian air force flight, one foreign official said apportioning blame for why it all went wrong must wait for another time. "Today the priority is getting out."

Those evacuating leave behind a city in turmoil. For two weeks Tripoli has echoed to the drumbeat of artillery, tank fire and rockets as rival militias trade fire, much of it landing on innocent civilians. One rocket strike on a house killed 23 Egyptian workers on Sunday, and thousands more are fleeing their homes.

Similar scenes are taking place in the eastern capital, Benghazi, where air force jets allied with a former general, Khalifa Hiftar, pounded Islamist militia bases in battles that left 36 dead.

The battles are part of a wider struggle between Islamists and their opponents, triggered by elections in late June for a new parliament, the house of representatives, that saw steep losses for Islamist parties.

Those parties, including the Muslim Brotherhood's Justice and Construction party, will almost certainly lose control of the legislature, and their militias fear they will be dissolved.

In Tripoli, an alliance of Islamist and Misratan militias is focused on dominating the city and ejecting a militia from Zintan, which is allied with Hiftar.

The Zintanis hold the airport and a wedge-shaped area in the south and west, all of it now the scene of ferocious violence. Rockets and artillery are directed at the airport and half a dozen districts, with the Zintanis replying in kind. But much of the firing is wild, hitting homes and apartments.

Petrol is scarce, power is more off than on and the internet has been cut. In the absence of security forces, anarchy has broken out. Several banks have been raided by gangs armed with anti-tank rockets, blowing open safes to steal millions of dinars, and kidnappings are rampant.

Tripoli's main medical warehouse has been ransacked by one militia group, leaving hospitals running out of drugs at a time when they most need them.

Seraj, a hotel worker, said he drove from hospital to hospital looking for drugs for his friend, each time being told they had run out. "We tried four hospitals, all give the same answer, no drugs. I can't go to more hospitals, there is no petrol."

Meanwhile, the government has collapsed. On Thursday night, the prime minister, Abdullah al Thinni, was refused permission to board his own plane and leave the city for the east, by the militia that controls Mitiga, Tripoli's second airport. The main international airport is now a battered ruin. The Guardian 

U.N. pulls staff out of Libya as clashes kill 13, close airports

Smoke rises near buildings after heavy fighting between rival militias broke out near the airport in Tripoli July 13, 2014.CREDIT: REUTERS/ HANI AMARA

(Reuters) - The United Nations on Monday pulled its staff out of #Libya where at least 13 people have been killed in fighting in the eastern city of Benghazi and in Tripoli, forcing the closure of the international airport.

Security and medical sources said at least six people had been killed and 25 wounded in Benghazi in heavy fighting between security forces and rival militias since late Sunday.

Militias also clashed in the capital Tripoli on Sunday, killing at least seven people, shutting the main airport and air control centre and effectively leaving Libya with no international flights. The fighting was the worst in the capital for six months.

The U.N. mission in Libya said the closure of Tripoli International Airport and the deteriorating security situation made it impossible to fulfil its work.

Several Grad rockets hit the airport, damaging the control tower, a Libyan official said. A Reuters reporter at the airport heard anti-aircraft guns and other heavy weapons. Rival militias have been fighting for control of the airport since Sunday. Residents earlier said a Grad rocket struck the airport perimeter late on Monday. No further details were available.

Three years after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi, Libya has slipped deeper into chaos with its weak government and new army unable to control brigades of former rebel fighters and militias who often battle for political and economic power.

In Benghazi, irregular forces loyal to renegade former general Khalifa Haftar bombarded Islamist militia bases as part of his campaign to oust militants, and special forces also clashed with militia fighters in the city.

Most of the dead and injured were civilians, according to security and medical sources at Benghazi hospital. At least 10 houses were hit with missiles and government offices and banks were forced to close.

Tripoli airport and Misrata city airport were closed on Monday which, along with the closure two months ago of Benghazi airport, leaves the country with only a land route to Tunisia, a flashback to the 1990s when Libya was under U.N. sanctions.

The Tripoli air control centre covering western Libya was closed because it was not safe for staff to go to work, aviation officials and state news agency Lana said on Monday. The control centre is responsible for traffic in Tripoli, Misrata and Sabha.

That leaves only the tiny Labraq and Tobruk airports in the east, with few international connections, open for traffic. People living in western Libya must make an arduous road journey to Tunisia.

Western powers fear chaos in Libya will allow arms and militants to flow across its borders. The south of the vast desert country has become a haven for Islamist militants kicked out of Mali by French forces earlier this year.

Libyan women’s rights advocate Salwa Abugaigis assassinated

Salwa Bugaighis, a lawyer, played an active part in Libya's 2011 revolution. (Photo courtesy: vitalvoices.org)

Human rights activist Salwa Bugaighis was shot dead by unknown assailants at her home in the restive east Libyan city of #Benghazi late Wednesday, hospital and security sources said.

“Unknown hooded men wearing military uniforms attacked Mrs Bugaighis in her home and opened fire on her,” said a security official, who did not wish to be named.

She was shot several times and taken to hospital in critical condition, where she died shortly afterwards, a spokesman for the Benghazi medical center said.

Her husband, who was in the family home at the time of the attack, has since been reported as missing, according to a family member.

“We've lost touch with him,” the relative said, adding that a security guard at the house had been shot and injured, but his life was not in danger.

Bugaighis, a lawyer, played an active part in Libya's 2011 revolution, which overthrew the regime of Muammar Qaddafi.

A former member of the National Transitional Council, the rebellion's political wing, she was vice president of a preparatory committee for national dialogue in Libya.

The U.S. ambassador to Libya, Deborah Jones called the news “heartbreaking”, and on her Twitter account denounced “a cowardly, despicable, shameful act against a courageous woman and true Libyan patriot”.

Earlier on Wednesday, Bugaighis had participated in Libya's general election. She published photos of herself at a polling station on her Facebook page.

Since the 2011 revolution, the east of Libya -- and in particular the country's second city of Benghazi -- has been a stronghold for jihadists, and the scene of attacks and assassinations targeting notably the military, police and judges.

At least three soldiers deployed to provide polling day security in Benghazi were killed in what security officials said was an attack on their convoy by Islamist militia.

Benghazi, which was the scene of a deadly attack on the U.S. consulate in 2012, has been tense since a rogue former rebel commander launched an offensive against powerful Islamist groups late last month, drawing many regular army units to his side. Al Arabiya

US tells its citizens to leave Libya among turbulence

The US has warned its citizens to leave the country, saying Libya is "unstable and unpredictable"

The US state department has warned any American citizens in Libya to leave the country immediately.

It said the situation in the country remained unpredictable and unstable.

On Tuesday, the US said it was sending a warship carrying around 1,000 marines to the region for any possible evacuation of American officials.

Concern over the situation in Libya has increased after a renegade general launched an assault against Islamist militias in Benghazi.

Gen Khalifa Haftar last week urged the judiciary to appoint a crisis government to oversee new elections after accusing Libya's leaders of "fostering terrorism".

Unrest in Libya has worsened in recent weeks after General Haftar vowed to take on Islamist militants

Dozens of state bodies have pledged their support for Gen Haftar.

But the government called his assault an "attempted coup" and ordered the arrest of those taking part.

The unstable situation has led the US to call for its citizens to leave the troubled country as soon as possible.

"US citizens currently in Libya should exercise extreme caution and depart immediately," the state department said on Tuesday.

It warned against all but essential travel to Tripoli and against any travel outside the Libyan capital.

A US official said USS Bataan, which carries around 1,000 marines, could deal with any evacuation

An American defence official told the AFP news agency that one of its warships was also being sent to the region in case US staff needed to be evacuated from Libya.

The USS Bataan, which carries around 1,000 US Marines and several helicopters, was to be in the area "in a matter of days," the official said, adding that it was a "precautionary" measure.

The US decision comes amid ongoing controversy over a September 2012 attack on the US consulate in Benghazi in which four Americans, including ambassador Christopher Stevens, were killed.

Gunmen attacked the home of Libya's new prime minister on Tuesday.

An aide to Ahmed Maiteg said the prime minister and his family were in the house at the time but escaped unharmed.

Mr Maiteg, 42, was elected prime minister earlier this month to replace Abdullah al-Thani, who resigned in April following an attack on his family.
Source: BBC News

Libya navy chief ‘wounded in attack on convoy

TRIPOLI - The Libyan navy’s chief of staff, his driver and two guards were wounded on Wednesday when gunmen attacked his convoy in Tripoli, the navy spokesman said.

Rear Admiral Hassan Abu Shnak was on his way to work when gunmen blocked his convoy in a western district of the capital and opened fire, Colonel Ayub Kassem told AFP. “He was lightly wounded in the head. A driver and two guards were also wounded, but their injuries are not life threatening.”

Meanwhile, the International Criminal Court on Wednesday rejected a final bid by Tripoli’s lawyers to try slain dictator Moamer Gaddafi’s son Seif al-Islam in Libya, meaning he must now be transferred to The Hague. Seif’s transfer to face charges relating to the bloody repression of the 2011 uprising that toppled his father is however a moot point as he is being held by a Libyan militia rather than any central authority in the chaos-wracked country.

The presiding ICC judge Erkki Kourulas struck down four grounds of appeal before the world’s war crimes court, saying “in the present case the Appeals Chamber confirms the (pre-trial chambers’) decision and dismisses the appeal.”

ICC pre-trial judges a year ago rejected Tripoli’s request to put him in the dock in Libya, saying the country was unable to give him a fair hearing.

This included Tripoli’s inability to transfer Seif, Gaddafi’s one-time heir apparent, to the Libyan capital from his prison in the hilltop stronghold of Zintan, where he is currently being held by militia members.
Tripoli appealed the original decision a few days later in June.

Seif, 41, and Gaddafi’s former spy chief Abdullah Senussi, around 64, have been charged for their roles in violent attempts to put down the 2011 uprising in the desert country that eventually toppled Gaddafi’s regime.
Seif appeared on May 11 by video link in a Tripoli court from Zintan, where he has been held since his capture by rebels in November 2011.

His court-appointed lawyer was unable to attend Sunday’s hearing, so the trial was adjourned to May 25 to allow him to help his client.

“The ICC Appeals decision today reinforces Libya’s long overdue obligation to surrender Seif Gaddafi to The Hague for fair trial,” Human Rights Watch’s international justice director Richard Dicker said. The Nation News

Why is Libya lawless?

Libya has been hit by instability since the overthrow of long-serving ruler Col Muammar Gaddafi in October 2011. Militias rule large swathes of territory, with successive governments struggling to exercise control. 

 

 Who is in control of Libya?

No-one - that is the problem. There are lots of different armed groups - up to 1,700 - with many different goals. But money and power is a common denominator.
During the uprising, anyone with a gun could command respect and some do not want that to change. Instead, they seem more determined than ever to gain more territory and impose their will.
They are also ideologically divided - some of them are Islamists, others are secessionists and yet others are liberals. Furthermore, the militias are split along ethnic and regional lines, making it a combustible mix. Some fear Libya could descend into civil war.

 Weren't they once allies?

General Kadafi

They were united in their hatred for Col Gaddafi - but nothing more. There was no single group in charge of the rebellion. Militias were based in different cities, fighting their own battles.
Several felt they had paid a particularly high price during the conflict and should be rewarded. And after more than four decades of authoritarian rule, they had little understanding of democracy. So, they were unable to forge compromises and build a new state based on the rule of law. As a result, Libya has had five governments since the 2011 revolution.

Didn't they receive outside help?

Very little. The US had pledged to help the new government recover weapons - especially anti-aircraft missiles that had gone missing when Col Gaddafi's government crumbled.
But Libya remains what some security analysts describe as an arms bazaar. It is awash with weapons which have also ended up in the hands of other armed groups in the region. There is no top-level mediation effort either - by Western powers or regional bodies like the Arab League and African Union (AU).

 Why not?

The West and Arab League appear to be more concerned about the instability in Syria and Egypt. As for the the AU, it has little influence in Libya - it opposed the Nato-backed offensive to oust Col Gaddafi, and is viewed with deep suspicion by Libya's authorities.
Yet African countries are most concerned about the conflict, fearing it could worsen instability in countries such as Mali and Niger. Weapons from Col Gaddafi's looted arsenals are also said to have been smuggled to the Sinai, Gaza and even Syria.

 Have foreigners been threatened?

Yes. There have been a spate of attacks on diplomats since 2012. They include the killing of US Ambassador Christopher Stevens in Benghazi, where the uprising against Col Gaddafi began, and the kidnapping of the Jordanian ambassador Fawaz al-Itan, who was released in exchange for a jihadist jailed in Jordan. There were also attacks on the Italian consulate in Benghazi, as well as the French and the Russian embassies in Tripoli. 

The US appears to be carrying out covert operations in Libya to neutralise the threat. It responded to Mr Stevens' death by capturing al-Qaeda suspect Anas al-Liby in Tripoli in October 2013.
Militias have also seized oil terminals, operated by Western firms. It has led to a huge fall in production, but has not had a major impact on the global oil market.

Which are the main militias?

Ansar al-Sharia is said to be the most dangerous Islamist armed group in Libya, along with its ally, the 17 February Martyrs Brigade. Ansar al-Sharia was blamed for Mr Stevens' killing, and is said to have forged links with other Islamists groups. Some analysts say Ansar al-Sharia have men who fought in Syria, though there has been no independent confirmation of this.
Colonel Khalifa Haftar also has a powerful militia, the Libya National Army (LNA). It was behind the 16 May air attack on an Islamist base in Benghazi while the allied Zintan militia launched an assault two days later on the parliamentary building in Tripoli. Col Haftar says his objective is to defeat the Islamists, though government officials accuse him of being a renegade simply driven by a thirst for power.

Who is Col Haftar?

Col Haftar helped Col Gaddafi seize power in 1969, and played a key role in Libya's military incursion into Chad in the 1980s. He later fell out with Col Gaddafi, and relocated to the #US.

He resurfaced in #Libya during the uprising against Col Gaddafi's rule, and built a militia that drew in other ex-Gaddafi loyalists. To many Libyans, he remains a shadowy figure who has caused much instability. His main base is in Benghazi, but he has shown his influence stretches to Tripoli.

How do Libyans feel?

Many of them live in fear - and have to move to safe places when fighting breaks out. They feel their dreams have been shattered - like many in neighbouring Egypt and Tunisia after their own popular uprisings.
But the situation in Libya is far more anarchic - that is because the army disintegrated after Col Gaddafi's fall, unlike in Egypt. Moreover, Libya has never had well-established political groups - like Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood and Tunisia's Ennahda - to champion the interests of their constituents.

So, the government is at the mercy of the militias. In fact, it pays many of the militiamen, hoping they will switch loyalties and help build a new national army but there is little evidence of that happening.
Source: BBC News

Khalifa Hiftar, the ex-general leading a revolt in Libya, spent years in exile in Northern Virginia

( Anja Niedringhaus/AP) - Then-senior rebel commander Khalifa Hiftar leaves a press conference in Benghazi in March 2011

Two weeks before he masterminded an assault on two major Libyan cities, Khalifa Hiftar hosted a dinner to court a potential ally. Hiftar was normally a confident man, a former general who had gone on to spend years in Northern #Virginia as an exiled opposition leader before returning home for the 2011 Libyan revolution.
But that night he seemed unsteady.

“Do you think I’m committing suicide?” Hiftar asked his new friend and supporter, businessman Fathallah Bin Ali, as they dined in the eastern city of #Benghazi.

Today, Hiftar, 71, is leading what may be the most serious challenge to the Libyan government since the overthrow of Moammar Gaddafi in 2011. Attacks by Hiftar’s forces on rival militias in Benghazi and Tripoli in recent days have left more than 70 people dead and dozens more injured. Militiamen loyal to him have overrun parliament.

Libya may now be sliding into civil war. On Monday, additional militias threw their weight behind Hiftar, including those at an air force base in the far-eastern city of Tobruk, fighters who have occupied swaths of the country’s oil infrastructure, and members of an important Benghazi militia. Meanwhile, fighters from the powerful city-state of Misurata said they would soon move on Tripoli to counter Hiftar’s assault.
Hiftar had plotted his operation for months, friends say. His goal is to rid the country of the Islamist militias that he accuses of terrorizing the country, assassinating and kidnapping their political rivals, in the three years since they all fought on the same side to oust a dictator.

Libya’s weak central government has failed to form a unified army and police force from the scores of well-armed militias that emerged from the revolution. And it has failed to stop the murders and kidnappings that have plagued this oil-rich country. That has led to an explosive situation in the young democracy.
“At this point, people are desperate,” said Bilal Bettamer, a 24-year-old Benghazi resident who organized a mass demonstration against the Islamist militias in the city in 2012. He said he was willing to trust Hiftar, “if he proves to be successful, and he proves that it’s not just for the personal glory.”

In February he startled the country by going on television and declaring a plan to save the nation. Nothing happened. But Hiftar was fed up with the lawlessness in Libya, Bin Ali said as he recalled their meeting.
“We have to stop it,” Hifter said, according to Bin Ali. Because the interim government and parliament were so ineffectual, “he decided to go for himself to try to fight for [his] rights,” the businessman said.

Switched sides in the 1980s

As a young army officer, Hiftar took part in the coup that brought Gaddafi to power in 1969. But Hiftar switched sides in the late 1980s, after he was captured while fighting for Gaddafi’s army in a war in neighboring Chad.

He became the leader of a rebel group called the Libyan National Army, which he claimed received U.S. assistance. He later sought refuge in the United States. He apparently became a U.S. citizen — he voted in Virginia in elections in 2008 and 2009, records show.

One member of a prominent Libyan opposition family who knew Hiftar when both were living in Northern Virginia noted that he and his family were comfortable. Hiftar resided in Falls Church until 2007 and later in a five-bedroom home in a quiet neighborhood in Vienna, near the golf course of the Westwood Country Club. He sold the second home in 2010 for $612,000, according to public records.

“They lived a very good life, and nobody knows what his source for compensation was,” said the acquaintance, who added that Hiftar’s family was not originally wealthy.
When Hiftar returned to Libya in 2011, he was welcomed as a hero and leader in the country’s burgeoning rebel forces.

But some who knew him said he was arrogant and angled for power.
“He was like a little child. He was actually trying to become the chief of staff,” said Jallal Galal, a former spokesman for the rebels. After the rebels chose another former general, Abdul Fattah Younis, to lead them, Hiftar was irate, Galal recalled.

Hiftar’s reputation as a prominent opposition figure, his military training in the Soviet Union in the 1970s and his wartime experience in Chad quickly brought him support on Libya’s front lines.

But his decades-long absence from the country also earned him suspicion and rivals. Those early splits in the rebel ranks would form the foundation of today’s power struggle.

Hiftar’s uprising began late last week, when forces loyal to him launched a wave of strikes against Islamist militias in Benghazi, setting off fierce battles. On Sunday, two other militias, claiming loyalty to Hiftar, attacked the country’s General National Congress in the capital before declaring the institution formally dissolved.

“The battle continues until the elimination of terrorism,” Col. Wanis Bu Khameida, the leader of the pro-Hiftar Benghazi militia, said in a televised news conference from the city.

On Monday, the head of Libya’s parliament called on his allied militias based in Misurata to come to the embattled legislature’s assistance. Militias in various parts of the country began to line up on either side, essentially pitting Islamist forces in Benghazi and their allies from Misurata against Gaddafi-era military officers. The latter group was backed by more-liberal politicians and tribal militias from Tripoli and the western mountains.

In one town in Libya’s Nafusa Mountains, two militias stated their support for opposing sides.
The head of Libya’s General National Congress, Nouri Abu Sahmein, called Hiftar’s offensive an “attempt to wreck the path of democracy” and said he must be stopped, the Associated Press reported.

Lawmakers undecided

But leading politicians seemed divided about what to do. Members of the country’s weak interim cabinet held an emergency meeting Monday and issued a vague open letter to the legislature, suggesting that it vote yet again for a new prime minister — replacing one chosen this month — and eventually be dissolved.
Parliament was scheduled to convene Tuesday. If it does, it would present a significant test of Hiftar’s power.
Some of Hiftar’s allies still appeared undecided Monday on whether they would follow him into an all-out confrontation.
“I’m not sure of his goals. He doesn’t seem to have a clear vision of what he’s really doing,” said one lawmaker who is part of a political alliance that is closely tied to the militias that attacked the legislature Sunday. He asked that his name not be published for safety reasons.
Source: Washington Post

Libyan authorities say 'coup' bid in restive Benghazi

The president of the General National Congress (GNC),
Nuri Abu Sahmein speaks during a press conference …

Libya's interim authorities on Saturday denounced an offensive launched by a rogue general in the restive eastern city of Benghazi against Islamists as a "coup" bid, a statement said.

The offensive by Khalifa Haftar against those he describes as "terrorists" is considered "an action outside state legitimacy and a coup d'etat," the army, government and parliament said in a joint statement.
"All those who took part in this coup bid will be prosecuted," said Nuri Abu Sahmein, the head of the General National Congress, interim parliament, reading from the joint statement on state television.
Interim prime minister Abdullah al-Thani, who has branded Haftar's forces as "outlaws", and armed forces chief of staff Abdessalam Jadallah al-Salihin, who has denied any army involvement in the Benghazi clashes, were shown on television standing next to Sahmein.

Khalifa, a retired general, used air power to pound Islamist positions in Benghazi on Friday, in a campaign to purge Libya's second city of "terrorists" that led to clashes in which 37 people were killed.
Haftar, who defected from the army of Moamer Kadhafi in the late 1980s, led ground forces in the NATO-backed 2011 uprising that toppled and killed the veteran dictator.

He now heads a group calling itself the "National Army," which launched Friday's operation to flush "terrorists" out of Benghazi, according to his spokesman Mohammed al-Hijazi.
The army says that he is being supported by tribes, officers who defected from the army as well ex-rebels who are opposed to the central government.

Earlier this year Haftar announced, in a video posted on the Internet, an "initiative" under which the interim government and parliament would be suspended.
That video sparked rumours on social media that a coup might be in the offing.
But the government, which has come in for criticism for failing to defeat lawlessness in Libya, was quick to quash the rumours and insist it was in control.

Libya has been rocked by lawlessness since the 2011 uprising, and authorities have struggled to assert their control over the vast, mostly desert country, which is awash with heavy weapons and effectively ruled by a patchwork of former rebel militias.
Source: AFP

Intelligence Chief Assassination In Bhengazi

Ibrahim Senussi’s car (Photo: Social media)

The head of #intelligence in eastern region, Colonel Ibrahim Senussi, was assassinated this afternoon, two days after he went on television to name names behind killings in the city.

His car was shot at near the #Benghazi medical college. Senussi then drove off, trying to escape but was followed.  He was then shot again some 200 metres further along the road, this time fatally – in the neck and chest, according to an eyewitness.
When Senussi spoke on #Libya Awalan #TV two days ago he was not named, but was introduced as the head of intelligence.
He said terrorist groups were targeting anyone who had been trained abroad since the revolution. He accused Ansar Al-Sharia of being behind much of the violence in the city. 
He also said that, unbeknown to their families, 58 young men had returned from Syria and were preparing to take part in suicide attacks. It was one of them, he added, that had been involved in the suicide attack on the headquarters of Brigade 21 on 29 April in which two Saiqa Special Forces members were killed. 
There are reports that yesterday there was an attempt to seize one of his staff.
Several members of intelligence have been killed or targeted in the past year.
Source: Libya Herald

Cable reconnected following telecoms blackout in the south, Libya

#Repairs have been made to a broken cable that severely disrupted  telecommunications and related services in Tarhouna, Bani Walid, Ashuwerif and Brak Al-Shati.

The cutting of the fibre optic cable in Geera in the Al-Shati area affected the Libyana mobile phone network, the Libya Telecom and Technology internet service and passport and banking systems yin the four districts.
Deputy #Telecommunications Minister Mohammed Blirass Ali told the #Libya #Herald that the cable had now been reconnected. It had been severed by accident during construction work. Such incidents had become all too common recently, he complained, because construction companies were ignoring guidelines.  Penalties were being considered to enure instructions were followed correctly, he added.
In January, there were three similar communication break downs, all related to cables being cut during construction.
Source: Libya Herald