5 persons killed in clashes in East Tripoli’s Arada district

Fighting today in the east Tripoli district of Arada, near Suq Al-Juma, is reported to have left four people dead and 17 others injured, seven of them seriously.

The cause of the clashes, which resulted in locals fleeing the streets and forced to remain indoors, is unclear. According to reports, it was a continuation of fighting that started last night in Ain Zara district further south between the members of the 42nd Battalion and the Abdul Raouf Al-Jabari Brigade. The former are based in Ain Zara, the latter in Arada. Both are said to have been legalised by the Presidency Council’s interior ministry.

The Jabari brigade was then counter-attacked today at its headquarters in Arada by the 42nd. A nearby building belonging to economy ministry is said to have been set alight in the fighting. According to another report, though, the fighting was about drugs dealing. This this has not been confirmed. The situation is now said to have calmed after Rada (deterrance) forces were sent in to re-establsh order in the district.

In the same context, The bodies of 21 Christians murdered by the so-called Islamic State in Sirte in February 2015 have been recovered and taken to a mortuary in Misrata for identification and a coroner’s inquest.

The announcement from the investigation bureau of Misrata’s Crime Prevention Department has been confirmed by the Attorney General’s office.

According to the bureau, all the heads were severed, the bodies were dressed in the orange “execution” outfits seen in a video of them being killed, and hands were been tied behind the backs.

Twenty of the murdered men were Egyptian, 13 of them from the same village of Al-Our in Egypt’s Minya governorate. The 21st was a sub-Saharan African, believed to be a Ghanaian.

The head of investigations at the Attorney General’s office, Sadek Assour, last week announced that the location where the bodies had been buried had been revealed by one of the IS members during interrogation.

On the other hand, The ISIS Fighting Operation Room (IFOR), loyal to Head of Government of National Accord (GNA) Fayez al-Sarraj, announced on Friday their full control of Sabratha after more than two weeks of heavy clashes against Brigade 48. The clashes between a security force loyal to the UN-backed GNA and the militia of the head of a former people-smuggling network, Ahmad Dabbashi, have led to many causalities.

“Sabratha city has been liberated from the militias – the Dabbashi militias and their alliance,” said Operations Room spokesman Saleh Graisia. “Now the city is fully controlled by the Operations Room… the militias have escaped to the west.” Graisia also hailed the Presidential Council for its support to their war on “terror”.

Directly after announcing the victory, Official spokesman for the Libyan National Army Colonel Miloud al-Zawi, praised efforts exerted by the Libyan forces, who achieved “victory” against whom he called the “Kharijites,” referring to Brigade 48. He called on the Libyan forces to preserve the city entirely and keep unity in preparation for liberating other cities in the western district.

The Libyan National Army (LNA), which has opposed the GNA and is headed by prominent Commander Khalifa Haftar, has also claimed ties to the Operations Room, leading to fears that the clashes in Sabratha could lead to a broader escalation of the conflict which developed in Libya after a 2011 uprising.

Zawi said this week that around 40 of its soldiers had been fighting in Sabratha. “We hope that Sabratha is a good sign for the LNA,” he said on Friday. The GNA, which had originally set up the security forces to fight ISIS during its brief occupation of central Sabratha in February 2016, welcomed the liberation announcement.

It expressed “great satisfaction with the positive developments at Sabratha,” in a statement posted on Facebook. Sabratha, 70 kilometers west of Tripoli where the GNA is based, is Libya’s main departure point for migrants trying to reach Europe.

Sabratha Municipal Council hailed the victory and said in a statement that the fighting was an internal issue aimed at eradicating criminals and ISIS fugitives. Fighting broke out in Sabratha on September 17 between Infantry Brigade 48 (Known as Martyr Anas Dibbashi Brigade) and the ISIS Fighting Operation Room, both claim loyalty to the Presidential Council in Tripoli.

Meanwhile, and in a statement issued Friday on his official Facebook page, Serraj expressed his full appreciation of the efforts made by the IFOR and his great satisfaction with the positive developments in the city. For his part, Haftar described the clashes in Sabratha as “a legitimate war between officers from the national army (IFOR) on the one hand and terrorist groups and human traffickers on the other hand.”

Haftar added that the war in Sabratha will not stop before these groups hand over their weapons and the foreign elements who are fighting with them and release the detained people for the purpose of blackmailing.