Tag: Libya

North Africa

Environmental protester shuts Libyan oil-field

The company operating Libya's biggest oilfield, Sharara, announced that it had been shut down after a citizen closed the pipeline that pumps the field's oil. The field is run by a joint venture between Libya's National Oil Corporation and several multinationals. The individual claimed the pipeline caused environmental damage to his lands, and had also closed the pipeline last year to press his demands for a clean-up. With this latest closure, Libya's oil output dropped to a six-month low of 750,000 barrels per day. National Oil Corporation chairman Mustafa Sanallah described those who shut down oil-fields as "terrorists." (Photo: Libya Observer)

North Africa

Displaced Libyans stranded in the desert

The UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons is calling on the government of Libya to protect hundreds of former residents of the town of Tawergha who are currently stranded in the desert. According to the UN, approximately 40,000 Tawarghans were forcefully evacuated in 2011 due to their perceived support for the country's former dictator Moammar Qaddafi, and their return has since been blocked by armed militia groups acting with the consent of the Libyan government. Although the Tawarghans are Libyan nationals, they appear to be suspected of supporting Qaddafi simply because many are of Black African ethnicity. As his army collapsed in 2011, Qaddafi brought in many Black African mercenaries in a last-ditch bid to hold onto power. (Photo: Mustafa Fetouri via The National, UAE)

North Africa

War crime seen in Benghazi mosque attack

Human Rights Watch condemned the deadly mosque attack in eastern Benghazi that left 34 people dead and 90 wounded, the majority of whom were civilians including three young children. The twin car blasts, within 30 minutes of each other, were timed to coincide with evening prayers. The second blast was intended to target first responders. No group has yet taken credit for the attack. "Planting bombs outside a civilian mosque, in particular when the timing is likely to inflict maximum casualties among civilians, is a war crime," the HRW statement said. "Civilians in Benghazi are unacceptably bearing the brunt of this conflict." (Map: CIA)

North Africa

Algeria, Libya mark Berber new year —at last

In a victory for Berber activists, Algeria officially celebrated Yennayer, the new year holiday of the Amazigh people, for the first time. The move is part of a general effort by Algeria's government to permit greater expression of Amazigh (Berber) culture in order to head off a separatist movement. Neighboring Libya also saw its first official Yennayer celebrations, although not on a national scale. The locally ruling Amazigh Supreme Council declared the holiday within the Berber self-governing zone in the country's western mountains. But elsewhere in the country there are signs of backsliding toward the intolerant stance of the Qaddafi dictatorship, when any expression of Amazigh language or culture had been strictly banned. A Berber activist in Benghazi, Rabee al-Jayash, was detained by forces of the city's reigning warlord, Khalifa Haftar, for public speaking and writing in the Amazigh tongue. (Photo: Amazigh World News)

North Africa
Libya

Libya: Europe ‘complicit’ in horrific abuses

European governments are knowingly "complicit" in the torture, abuse and exploitation of tens of thousands of refugees and migrants detained by the Libyan immigration authorities or criminal gangs in appalling conditions, Amnesty International charges in a new report.  Dozens of migrants and refugees told Amnesty about collusion between detention center guards, the Libyan Coast Guard and smugglers. European countries and especially Italy have been aiding Libyan authorities in migrant interception, as well as striking deal with local militias.

North Africa

Libya slave trade becomes political football

Propagandists of the isolationist right and anti-war “left” alike are exploiting the chilling emergence of a slave trade in abducted Black African migrants in Libya’s remote desert south as evidence that the NATO intervention of 2011 only led to nightmares. The popular uprising that ousted Qaddafi is invisible to them—as is the dictator’s own culpability in the social collapse that followed his rule.

North Africa

Benghazi suspect convicted on terror charge

A jury in Washington DC acquitted the accused ringleader of the 2012 Benghazi attacks of murder but convicted him on terrorism charges. After five days of deliberations, the jury found Ahmed Abu Khatallah guilty on four counts of related to the assault on a US mission and CIA compound in the Libyan city. US Ambassador Christopher Stevens and two CIA men were killed in the attack. Abu Khatallah may face life imprisonment. A sentencing date has not yet been set.

North Africa

UN calls for joint tribunal over Libyan war crimes

The head of the UN Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL), Ghassan Salamé, suggested to the United Nations Security Council that a joint tribunal should be considered to try individuals suspected of war crimes in Libya. Salamé warned that Libya is in a state of lawlessness, with crimes being committed each day. Salamé stated, "If Libyans alone cannot combat impunity for war crimes, it is time for the international community to consider mechanisms that can help them do so."

North Africa

Libya: rights groups accuse UAE of war crimes

At a press conference on the sidelines of the UN Human Rights Council meeting in Geneva, Libyan human rights groups accused the United Arab Emirates of committing war crimes in the country, including killing hundreds of civilians. The rights groups said that the UAE committed these crimes through direct air-strikes on Libya, and by backing the renegade general Khalifa Haftar.

North Africa

Libya: videos capture summary executions

Forces of the Libyan National Army, loyal to the country's unrecognized eastern government, appear to have executed captured fighters in Benghazi and desecrated corpses, Human Rights Watch charges. Videos posted online seem to show LNA fighters carrying out summary executions of "extremists," who are seen blindfolded with their hands tied behind their backs in orange jumpsuits. The International Criminal Court has issued a warrant for the commander of the unit.

North Africa

Libya: Haftar vows to attack Italian warships

The military commander of Libya's unrecognized eastern government, Khalifa Haftar, threatened to bombard any warships entering the country's national waters—an explicit challenge to Italy, which is dispatching vessels to the Libyan coast as part of its effort to intercept migrants seeking to cross the Mediterranean from North Africa.  The statement took aim at the Tripoli government, which Haftar accused of entering into agreements with foreign powers that "violate the sovereignty of Libya under the pretext of fighting illegal immigration."

North Africa

Libya: fatwa against ‘infidel’ Berbers

The Amazigh Supreme Council (ASC) of Libya, representing the Berbers in the country's western mountains, responded strongly to the fatwa issued by clerical authorities attached to the "Interim Government" based in Libya's east against the practice of Ibadhi branch of Islam. The fatwa refers to Ibadhi Muslims as "infidels." Nearly all followers of Ibadhi Islam in Libya are ethnic Berbers in the Nafusa Mountains. The ASC called the fatwa "a direct incitement for genocide."