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Benghazi clashes leave at least 27 dead as protests grow over Libya's militias Dozens killed after Benghazi militia opens fire on protesters
(about 2 hours later)
Clashes between protesters and militias aligned with the military in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi have left at least 27 people killed and dozens wounded, a health official said on Sunday. At least 26 people were killed and 80 wounded when a militia in the Libyan city of Benghazi opened fire on protestors gathered outside its base on Saturday.
The violence broke out on Saturday after protesters stormed a base belonging to Libya Shield, a grouping of militias with roots in the rebel groups that fought in the country's 2011 civil war. The demonstrators had gathered outside the headquarters of the Libya Shield brigade to demand the brigade submit to the authority of Libya's security forces.
Protesters were demanding militias leave their camp and submit to the authority of Libya's security forces. The death toll is likely to increase public backlash against militias, which have been accused of acting with impunity, abusing citizens and enforcing their own agendas. Television pictures showed people and cars fleeing in panic from the scene amid the crackle of gunfire.
Benghazi saw anti-militia demonstrations after the attack last September that killed the US ambassador Chris Stevens and three other US citizens. But the Libyan security forces remain weak, and continue to rely on militia help. Benghazi's Jala hospital was overwhelmed with casualties being brought in by ambulance and private car, with doctors saying they were struggling to cope.
Mohamed Belied, who is director at the city's al-Jala hospital, said the deaths were caused by gunshots and explosive fragments. Libyan officials have provided few details about the clashes. It remains unclear how many of the casualties were protesters and how many were members of the militias. Officials originally reported a total of seven dead. The Libyan prime minister, Ali Zidan, made a televised appeal for calm, and promised an investigation.
The Libyan prime minister, Ali Zidan, in a statement issued early on Sunday, described the events in Benghazi as sad and painful and urged people to be cautious and exercise self-restraint. The killings came when an organised protest march, calling for militias to disband, wound its way through the streets of this eastern city to the Libya Shield base. A similar march was held without incident in Tripoli.
Protesters demand that a checkpoint at the entrance of the city is removed and that members of Libya Shield leave the camp so the police and the army to take control of security, he said. What happened next is unclear. There were reports that some in the crowd threw stones at the base, and militiamen fired back.
Full details would be announced when investigations were completed, Zidan added. "We have to find a solution to the weapons in the hands of people, so that such events would not happen again." A spokesman for Libya Shield, Adel Tarhuni, claimed his men had no choice but to open fire after the base was attacked, and said one of his soldiers was among the dead. "We had to defend ourselves," he told a Libyan TV station.
Colonel Ali al-Shikhi, an armed forces spokesman, said the armed forces had taken control of the situation inside the camp, including protecting heavy weapons stores. He added that the events were the result of "irregular co-ordination" between the people and the armed men in the camp, who are considered a reserve force for the Libyan army. Resentment has been growing across Libya over the refusal of revolutionary militias to heed calls by the government to disband.
The fighting was the latest episode of lawlessness in Libya, which is going through a rocky transition after the overthrow of the Gaddafi regime in 2011. Last month militias laid-siege to Libya's foreign and justice ministries, demanding Zidan's resignation and that "revolutionaries" be given posts in key ministries.
Security remains elusive in the country, which is still awash with weapons from the war and prone to outbreaks of violence over private and political affairs. A feud led to clashes last week between tribes of African and Arab origins in southern Libya, leaving five people dead. In March, militias demanding a purge of Gaddafi-era officials stormed the general national congress, with a hail of gunfire striking the car of the former speaker Mohammed Magariaf.
Anger at the power of militias is acute in Benghazi. After an Islamist militia was blamed for the killing of the US ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans last September, protestors stormed a series of militia bases.
But the militias were allowed to remain in place by the government, in return for coming under army jurisdiction.
This arrangement will now come under intense scrutiny following Saturday's events, the worst single-day death toll since the end of the civil war in 2011.
Zidan's problem is that the government's own security forces are too feeble to impose order, relying on militia forces for security in many parts of the country.
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