Airstrike kills 44 migrants in Libyan detention center

BENGHAZI, Libya — An airstrike hit a detention center for migrants near the Libyan capital of Tripoli early Wednesday, killing at least 44 people and wounding dozens of others in an attack that the U.N. human rights chief said could amount to a war crime.

The Tripoli-based government blamed the attack on forces associated with Gen. Khalifa Hifter, whose Libyan National Army has been waging an offensive against rival militias in the capital of the war-torn North African country since April.

It refocused attention and raised questions about the European Union’s policy of cooperating with the militias that hold migrants in crowded and squalid detention centers to prevent them from crossing the Mediterranean to seek better lives in Europe. Most of them were apprehended by the Libyan coast guard, which is funded and trained by the EU to stem the flow of migrants.

At the United Nations, the Security Council scheduled an emergency session for later Wednesday on the airstrike in Tripoli’s Tajoura neighborhood, and Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for an independent investigation.

Hifter’s forces said they were targeting a nearby military site, not the detention center. There also were suspicions of involvement by foreign countries allied with his forces. Countries assisting Hifter include Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Russia.

Two migrants interviewed by The Associated Press said the airstrike hit a compound that houses a weapons warehouse and an adjacent detention center holding about 150 migrants, including several Sudanese and Moroccans. The two spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.

Online video purported to be from inside the detention center showed blood and human remains mixed with rubble and the belongings of the victims.

The U.N. gave an initial figure of 44 dead and more than 130 wounded. But the two migrants told the AP that three or four escaped harm and about 20 were wounded. They said the rest were killed, indicating the final death toll could be much higher.

Prince Alfani, the Libya medical coordinator for Doctors Without Borders, visited the detention center hours before the airstrike and said it had held 126 migrants. Survivors fear for their lives, he said, urging their immediate evacuation.

Charlie Yaxley, a spokesman for the U.N. refugee agency, said the detention center’s proximity to the weapons depot “made it a target for the airstrikes.”

“Coordinates of this detention center were well-known to both sides of the conflict,” Yaxley said. “It was known that there were 600 people living inside. So there can be no excuse for this center having been hit.”

He said the agency had warned less than two months ago that anyone in the complex could be caught in the fighting and an earlier airstrike nearby had wounded two migrants. The UNHCR is sending medical teams to the site, he added.

U.N. human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said the attack “may, depending on the precise circumstances, amount to a war crime.”

The attack “killed by surprise innocent people whose dire conditions forced them to be in that shelter,” said U.N. envoy for Libya Ghassan Salame.

The Tripoli-based Government of National Accord, which is backed by the U.N., called for an investigation by the world body.

Libya became a major crossing point for migrants to Europe after the overthrow and death of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011, when the North African nation was thrown into chaos, armed militias proliferated and central authority collapsed.