Libya enforces militia ban in Benghazi

The Libyan interim government announced the formation of a ministerial committee to enforce the ban on militias in the eastern city of Benghazi on Wednesday. The government announced on its website, that the committee will be headed by Higher Education Minister Mohamed Abu-Bakr, Housing Minister Ali Al-Sharif, Transport Minister Abdel-Qader Ahmed and former Interior Minister Ashour Shuwail, who is now an adviser to the prime minister. The ministerial panel is commissioned to enforce the General National Congress' law that orders the expulsion of all illegal armed militias from the area. The announcement came just one day after Prime Minister Ali Zeidan's third visit to Benghazi for a meeting with Libyan security officers about the security crisis in the city. Benghazi witnessed a new wave of violence last week, which came after clashes between the Salafi militia Ansar al-Sharia and the Libyan army's special forces. Over the past two years, the security situation in Benghazi as well as in the entire eastern region of Cyrenaica has deteriorated as Islamic fundamentalist militias threaten stability and the establishment of state security forces.