At least 27 people were killed in Libya and around 100 others injured in violent clashes between two influential armed groups from Monday 14 to Tuesday 15 August in the southeastern suburbs of Tripoli, the capital. . The provisional assessment was established by the Center for Emergency Medicine, the agency responsible for relief in the west of the country.
According to the same source, 234 families have been rescued and extracted, as well as several dozen foreign doctors or nurses, stranded since Monday night in combat zones. Three field hospitals and around 60 ambulances were mobilized to rescue the wounded and evacuate civilians to safer areas. Flights had to be suspended at Mitiga airport, the only civilian airport in the capital, and planes temporarily evacuated from the tarmac.
The fighting started after the arrest on Monday of Colonel Mahmoud Hamza, commander of “Brigade 444”, by the “Al-Radaa Force”. These two groups are among the most influential in Tripoli, where sits one of the two governments which are vying for power in a country undermined, since the fall of the regime of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, by divisions fueled by the proliferation of armed groups. shifting allegiances. No information has been given so far on the reasons for his arrest.
Late Tuesday, the “social council”, made up of notables and influential figures from Soug el-Joumaa, a sector south-east of Tripoli and stronghold of the “Al-Radaa Force”, announced that it had reached an agreement with the head of the government sitting in Tripoli, Abdelhamid Dbeibah, to transfer Colonel Mahmoud Hamza to a “neutral party”, without naming it.
UN calls for ‘immediate de-escalation’
In a statement read on television by its dean, this council said that a de-escalation and a ceasefire will follow this measure, which allowed a return to calm overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday in Tripoli. Accompanied by his interior minister, Imed Trabelsi, the prime minister went overnight to Ain Zara, one of the areas south-east of Tripoli most affected by the clashes. Walking through the streets of this densely populated district, Mr. Dbeibah “noted the extent of the damage” before giving instructions to identify the “material damage in order to compensate the citizens”, according to the government media center on Facebook.
For its part, the Ministry of the Interior has put in place a security device to supervise the ceasefire and deploy forces in the most tense sectors of the city. Commercial flights, diverted to Misrata, 200 kilometers further east, had still not resumed Wednesday morning in Tripoli.
Libya is trying to extricate itself from more than a decade of chaos since the fall of Muammar Gaddafi’s regime in 2011, plagued by divisions and foreign interference. Two governments have been vying for power there for more than a year: one based in Tripoli (West) led by Mr. Dbeibah and recognized by the UN, the other in the East, supported by the powerful Marshal Khalifa. Haftar.
On Tuesday, the UN support mission in Libya (Manul) said in a statement that it “follows with concern” the events and “their impact on civilians”, calling for “immediate de-escalation”, “dialogue and to “maintain the advances made in safety over the past few years.” Statements from the embassies of the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Italy and the European Union echoed Manul’s calls for a cessation of hostilities.
