US air strike kills dozens at IS camp in Libya
TRIPOLI: A US air strike on a jihadist training camp in Libya killed dozens of people Friday, probably including a senior Islamic State group operative behind attacks in Tunisia, officials said.
Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook said Noureddine Chouchane, also known as ‘Sabir’, and other jihadists had been planning attacks against American and other Western interests.
“We took this action against Sabir in the training camp after determining that both he and the ISIL fighters at these facilities were planning external attacks on US and other Western interests in the region ,” Cook said, without providing specifics.
“We see what’s happening in Iraq and Syria and we believe that these fighters in Libya posed a threat to our national security interests.”
It was the second US air raid in the violence-wracked North African country targeting the fast-expanding jihadist group in the past three months.
The strike early Friday near the city of Sabratha ‘likely killed’ IS operative Chouchane, a US official said earlier.
Britain’s defence ministry said the strike on the camp was carried out from a Royal Air Force base, RAF Lakenheath.
“I was satisfied that its destruction makes us all safer, and I personally authorised the US use of our bases,” Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said in a statement. A jihadist safe house was destroyed in the dawn raid about 70 kilometres west of Tripoli, according to Hussein alDawadi, an official in Sabratha near the border with Tunisia.
“The raid killed 41 people who were all inside the house,” Dawadi told AFP. “The vast majority of those killed were Tunisians who were probably members of IS.”
Cook would not confirm the figure but said a ‘significant’ number was dead, and that as many as 60 people had been known to use the camp.
A suspect wounded in the strike said he had been taken there blindfolded for combat training, Dawadi added.
Tunisia’s interior ministry issued a picture of Chouchane Friday and a statement saying he was a “dangerous terrorist” and a wanted man. The Sabratha Municipal Council’s website said rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and other weapons were found in the house, which was rented by foreigners including Tunisians.
It posted pictures of mattresses and blankets among the rubble and a piece of metal with the inscription ‘Islamic State’.
An AFP photographer saw four large holes he said were probably caused by missiles.
“We heard four big hits at around 3 am that shook our houses,” resident Moussaab Kamouka said.
Chouchane is suspected of being behind an attack in July on a beach resort near the Tunisian city of Sousse that killed 38 tourists — including 30 Britons.
He is also accused of involvement in an attack on the National Bar do Museum in Tunis in March that killed 21 tourists and a policeman. — AFP
We took this action against Sabir in the training camp after determining that both he and the ISIL fighters at these facilities were planning external attacks on US and other Western interests in the region. — Peter Cook, Pentagon press secretary