Benghazi militants under offensive

benghazi — Forces loyal to Libya’s military strongman Khalifa Haftar on Monday launched an offensive to oust militants from their last two strongholds in second city Benghazi, they said.

Forces loyal to Haftar, who does not recognise a UN-backed unity government in Tripoli and backs a rival parliament, have retaken most of the coastal city since it was overrun by militants in 2014.

Riadh Chehibi, an officer in Haftar’s self-styled Libyan National Army, said the forces advanced in the central district of Al Sabri and Souq Al Hout area near the port, where militants are surrounded.

Haftar’s forces retook certain positions from the militants, but reported no casualties among their ranks, Chehibi said.

Footage and pictures shared online showed columns of tanks, armoured vehicles and ambulances heading towards the neighbourhoods. Many militants found refuge in Al Sabri and Souq Al Hout after the LNA drove them from the city’s western districts in March.

In April, the military authorities in Benghazi asked civilians living near these districts to leave their homes to avoid being caught in the crossfire.

Militant groups in the city include the Revolutionary Shura Council of Benghazi, an alliance of Islamist militias among them suspected members of the terrorist Daesh group and the Al Qaeda-linked Ansar Al Shariah. In another video being shared online on Monday, an LNA officer is shown shooting dead a man said to be a suspected Daesh member from Algeria.

The footage shows the officer holding his gun to the head of the prisoner, who is kneeling down with his hands on his head. In March, rights group Human Rights Watch said Haftar’s forces may have committed war crimes as it fights militants in Benghazi. —