Libyan National Army Targets GNA in Sirte

Members of Misrata forces, under the protection of Tripoli's forces, prepare themselves to go to the front line in Tripoli, Libya (File photo: Reuters)
Members of Misrata forces, under the protection of Tripoli's forces, prepare themselves to go to the front line in Tripoli, Libya (File photo: Reuters)
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Libyan National Army Targets GNA in Sirte

Members of Misrata forces, under the protection of Tripoli's forces, prepare themselves to go to the front line in Tripoli, Libya (File photo: Reuters)
Members of Misrata forces, under the protection of Tripoli's forces, prepare themselves to go to the front line in Tripoli, Libya (File photo: Reuters)

The Libyan National Army (LNA), led by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, said it has raided sites of armed militias loyal to the Government of National Accord (GNA) in the coastal city of Sirte, and thwarted an attack south of the capital, Tripoli.

LNA’s air force attacked Wednesday morning various targets in Qaradabiya airbase in Sirte after it had received military intelligence tips on the locations, according to LNA spokesman Ahmed al-Mismari.

Mismari added that the targets included a military operations room used to control drones and some sites storing and hiding drones.

He added that fighter jets bombed the sites in precise targets.

The spokesman said in the statement that the operation has achieved its objectives, and completely destroyed the facilities.

The LNA leadership announced that the main purpose of the strikes was to destroy the terrorist militias’ capabilities and prevent them from targeting the National Army.

In other news, Volcano of Rage Operation launched by the forces and militias loyal to the GNA, chaired by Fayez al-Sarraj, distributed photographs showing the destruction caused by the LNA in what it termed as an “indiscriminate shelling” in Saladin area in an attempt to compensate for the National Army’s losses south of Tripoli.

Meanwhile, Sarraj has ordered a 40 percent drop in the salaries of GNA representatives, and another decrease of 30 percent in salaries of advisers, starting 2020.

Sarraj’s office issued a statement on Facebook, saying the decrease in the wages will also include the Prime Minister and will be in effect starting January.

It also asked the Ministry of Finance to provide a proposal for the percentage to be cut from the salaries of the state administrative authorities' employees as well as to take the necessary measures to unify the salary for all public sector staff in Libya.



Evidence of Ongoing 'Crimes Against Humanity' in Darfur, Says ICC Deputy Prosecutor

A boy sits atop a hill overlooking a refugee camp near the Chad-Sudan border, November 9, 2023. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig/File Photo
A boy sits atop a hill overlooking a refugee camp near the Chad-Sudan border, November 9, 2023. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig/File Photo
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Evidence of Ongoing 'Crimes Against Humanity' in Darfur, Says ICC Deputy Prosecutor

A boy sits atop a hill overlooking a refugee camp near the Chad-Sudan border, November 9, 2023. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig/File Photo
A boy sits atop a hill overlooking a refugee camp near the Chad-Sudan border, November 9, 2023. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig/File Photo

There are "reasonable grounds to believe that war crimes and crimes against humanity" are being committed in war-ravaged Sudan's western Darfur region, the deputy prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) said.

Outlining her office's probe of the devastating conflict which has raged since 2023, Nazhat Shameem Khan told the UN Security Council that it was "difficult to find appropriate words to describe the depth of suffering in Darfur," AFP reported.

"On the basis of our independent investigations, the position of our office is clear. We have reasonable grounds to believe that war crimes and crimes against humanity, have been and are continuing to be committed in Darfur," she said.

The prosecutor's office focused its probe on crimes committed in West Darfur, Khan said, interviewing victims who fled to neighboring Chad.

She detailed an "intolerable" humanitarian situation, with apparent targeting of hospitals and humanitarian convoys, while warning that "famine is escalating" as aid is unable to reach "those in dire need."

"People are being deprived of water and food. Rape and sexual violence are being weaponized," Khan said, adding that abductions for ransom had become "common practice."

"And yet we should not be under any illusion, things can still get worse."

The Security Council referred the situation in Darfur to the ICC in 2005, with some 300,000 people killed during conflict in the region in the 2000s.

In 2023, the ICC opened a fresh probe into war crimes in Darfur after a new conflict erupted between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF).

The RSF's predecessor, the Janjaweed militia, was accused of genocide two decades ago in the vast western region.

ICC judges are expected to deliver their first decision on crimes committed in Darfur two decades ago in the case of Ali Mohamed Ali Abd-Al-Rahman, known as Ali Kosheib, after the trial ended in 2024.

"I wish to be clear to those on the ground in Darfur now, to those who are inflicting unimaginable atrocities on its population -- they may feel a sense of impunity at this moment, as Ali Kosheib may have felt in the past," said Khan.

"But we are working intensively to ensure that the Ali Kosheib trial represents only the first of many in relation to this situation at the International Criminal Court," she added.