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French Embassy in Libya Is Attacked French Embassy in Libya Attacked
(about 1 hour later)
CAIRO — The French Embassy in Libya was struck by what was reported to be a car bomb on Tuesday, injuring two French guards, according Libyan media accounts and French authorities who called the attack “odious.” CAIRO — The explosion of a car parked outside the French Embassy in Libya wounded two French guards on Tuesday in what appeared to be the first major terrorist attack on a diplomatic compound in the capital since the ouster of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi in 2011.
The assault was described as the first of its kind in the Libyan capital since the revolt beginning in 2011 that toppled Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, but it was not the first attack on a diplomatic building in Libya. If deliberate, the blast would be the most significant such attack on a diplomatic facility in Libya since a siege of a United States outpost in Benghazi last September, in which Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed. A string of more minor attempted attacks on Western or United Nations diplomats began before that attack and has continued since then, although mostly outside the capital.
Last September in the eastern city of Benghazi, militants struck at two American facilities, killing the American ambassador, J. Christopher Stevens, and three other Americans. Last month, Libyan security officials said they had arrested two men in the kidnapping near Benghazi of five British humanitarian activists, at least two of them women who had been sexually assaulted. No one claimed responsibility Tuesday, following the pattern of earlier attacks. But Libyans immediately suspected militant Islamists angry over the French intervention in Mali, where French troops are supporting government efforts to oppose Islamic militants in the north of the country. The assault came a day after the French Parliament voted to extend the French military deployment there.
On Tuesday, Reuters quoted residents living near the French diplomatic compound in Tripoli, the Libyan capital, as saying they heard two explosions in the early morning. In the months since French soldiers landed in Mali in January to roll back an attempted takeover by hard-line Islamists, militants in Libya and around the region have denounced the invasion as a new imperialist adventure by the Mali’s former colonial ruler.
“We think it was a booby trapped car,” a French Embassy official told Reuters. “There was a lot of damage and there are two guards wounded.” And in Libya that anger has blended with mistrust of the motives behind France’s leading role in the Western airstrikes to help topple Colonel Qaddafi. While most Libyans are overwhelmingly grateful for the French airstrikes that stopped Colonel Qaddafi’s troops from crushing the insurrection against him at its start in Benghazi, Islamist militants and others believe the Western powers also sought oil and influence for themselves.
The attack raised worries among Tripoli residents that the security situation there was unraveling further. On Tuesday, Laurent Fabius, the French foreign minister, condemned the attack and pledged a swift investigation. The French and Libyan authorities would “make every effort to ensure that the circumstances of this odious act are exposed and it perpetrators quickly identified,” Mr. Fabius said in a statement from Paris.
Since the fall of Colonel Qaddafi, Tripoli had generally been seen as safer than Benghazi, which many foreigners avoid. But the country as a whole is viewed by outsiders as potentially perilous with many weapons in the hands of citizens and militias beyond government control. Many foreigners in Tripoli take elaborate security precautions. An official in his ministry said Mr. Fabius would travel to Libya on Tuesday.
The French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, was quick to issue a statement in Paris calling Tuesday’s attack odious. Mr. Fabius said he condemned the attack with the utmost vigor and said French and Libyan authorities would make every effort to shed light on the circumstances surrounding the attack. Separately, President Franςois Hollande said the bombing was “aimed, by way of France, at all the countries of the international community engaged in the struggle against terrorism.”
The assault came a day after the French Parliament voted to extend the French military deployment in Mali, but there was no indication whether the attack was linked to that development. No group immediately took responsibility for the blast. “France expects the Libyan authorities to shed the fullest light on this unacceptable act, so that the perpetrators are identified and brought to justice,” Mr. Hollande said in a statement.

Steven Erlanger contributed reporting from Paris.

Such an inquiry, however, may be difficult. The new Libyan government commands few disciplined police or military officers, and they often appear outmatched by the freewheeling militia formed during and after the uprising against Colonel Qaddafi. Even seven months after the death of the American ambassador, little progress has been made to identify or punish his killers.
The explosion Tuesday morning took place at around 7 a.m. in Tripoli and tore through a wall of the French Embassy compound. Smoke billowed from the burning remains of a car believe to have been used as a bomb. Residents said the blast was one of the largest explosions in Tripoli since Colonel Qaddafi’s fall.
Aside from the two guards, the embassy was largely empty at the time of the blast, limiting the casualties. Speaking on condition of anonymity, a French diplomat on the scene said the blast had destroyed half the building. Damage from the force of the blast extended about five hundred yards, breaking windows in neighboring buildings and houses. A broken water main flooded the street.
The diplomat said one of the two injured guards had left the hospital while the other was in a more serious condition.
Attacks or bombings targeting Western diplomats have been more common around the eastern city of Benghazi, in a region known as a center of Islamist militancy. But since the killing of the United States ambassador most Western diplomats have pulled out of Benghazi and retreated to better-secured facilities in Tripoli, in the West.
In January, Italy, the former colonial power in Libya, closed its consulate in Benghazi and withdrew its staff because of security concerns after an attempted ambush of the Italian consul. Last month, Libyan security officials said they had arrested two men in the kidnapping near Benghazi of five British humanitarian activists, at least two of them women who had been sexually assaulted.
The attack on the French Embassy, however, may raise new questions about the possibility that militants may now try to strike other targets in the capital as well. The country as a whole is viewed by outsiders as potentially perilous with many weapons in the hands of citizens and militias beyond government control. Most foreigners in Tripoli take elaborate security precautions.

Reporting was contributed by Suliman Ali Zway from Benghazi, Libya, Osama Al-Fitori from Tripoli, Libya, Alan Cowell from London and Steven Erlanger from Paris.