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Libya Identifies 12 Bodies Buried in Mass Graves

A mass grave is seen in the western Libyan city of Tarhuna. (Tarhuna Victims Association)
A mass grave is seen in the western Libyan city of Tarhuna. (Tarhuna Victims Association)
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Libya Identifies 12 Bodies Buried in Mass Graves

A mass grave is seen in the western Libyan city of Tarhuna. (Tarhuna Victims Association)
A mass grave is seen in the western Libyan city of Tarhuna. (Tarhuna Victims Association)

The Tarhuna Victims Association said on Sunday it has identified 12 bodies recovered last month from mass graves in the western Libyan town of Tarhuna, where scores of corpses have been discovered in recent years.

The 12 corpses include six from Tarhuna, two from each of Qasr Bin Ghashir and Tripoli, one from each of Souq al-Khamis and Bani Walid, it announced.

Residents of the city accuse the Kani militia of committing these crimes over two years ago. The discovery of the mass graves drew widespread local and international condemnation and demands for accountability.

Soon after the war waged by the Libyan National Army on Tripoli ended in June 2020, residents in Tarhuna discovered mass graves with hundreds of bodies. The victims were of all ages and showed signs of torture.

The Victims Association said one of the identified bodies was that of Faraj Al-Sharif Masoud Al-Tarhuni, born in 1989, and who worked for a catering company at Tripoli airport.

Tarhouni is from Qasr Bin Ghashir. He was kidnapped from his home by the Kani militia in June 2019. His corpse was found in one of the mass graves in mid-October 2021.

The Association also identified the body of Tarhuna native Abd al-Hakim Moftah Saad Doma. Born in 1976, he worked in the education sector.

He was kidnapped by the Kani militia in August 2019 and his corpse was found in a mass grave on October 4, 2021.

Last month, International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor Karim Khan expressed his shock at the large number of mass graves found in Tarhuna.

He met with families of the victims, saying he had never seen such crimes before in the entire world.

The Libyan prosecution is still investigating the crimes, while the Kani militia has been accused of killing hundreds of prisoners in retaliation to the killing of its leader Mohsen al-Kani.

The Kani militia was comprised of six brothers and their loyalists. They at one point controlled Tarhuna, terrorizing the people and cracking down on dissenting voices..

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Syria Monitor: 101 Killed in Battles between Pro-Türkiye, Kurdish Forces

A fighter affiliated with Syria's new administration shoots at pictures of Syria's ousted president Bashar al-Assad (R) and his late father and former president Hafez al-Assad, inside the abandoned Syrian Republican Guard (SRG) base near Damascus on January 4, 2025. (Photo by Bakr ALKASEM / AFP)
A fighter affiliated with Syria's new administration shoots at pictures of Syria's ousted president Bashar al-Assad (R) and his late father and former president Hafez al-Assad, inside the abandoned Syrian Republican Guard (SRG) base near Damascus on January 4, 2025. (Photo by Bakr ALKASEM / AFP)
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Syria Monitor: 101 Killed in Battles between Pro-Türkiye, Kurdish Forces

A fighter affiliated with Syria's new administration shoots at pictures of Syria's ousted president Bashar al-Assad (R) and his late father and former president Hafez al-Assad, inside the abandoned Syrian Republican Guard (SRG) base near Damascus on January 4, 2025. (Photo by Bakr ALKASEM / AFP)
A fighter affiliated with Syria's new administration shoots at pictures of Syria's ousted president Bashar al-Assad (R) and his late father and former president Hafez al-Assad, inside the abandoned Syrian Republican Guard (SRG) base near Damascus on January 4, 2025. (Photo by Bakr ALKASEM / AFP)

More than 100 combatants were killed over the last two days in northern Syria in fighting between Turkish-backed groups and Syrian Kurdish forces, a war monitor said on Sunday.
Since Friday evening, clashes in several villages around the city of Manbij have left 101 dead, including 85 members of pro-Turkish groups and 16 from the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The SDF said it had repelled "all the attacks from Türkiye’s mercenaries supported by Turkish drones and aviation".
The Turkish defense ministry said it had "neutralized" 32 Kurdish fighters in northern Syria, without providing further details.
Turkish-backed factions in northern Syria resumed their fight with the SDF at the same time as the opposition armed factions were launching an offensive on November 27 that overthrew Syrian president Bashar al-Assad just 11 days later.
The pro-Ankara groups succeeded in capturing Kurdish-held Manbij and Tal Rifaat in northern Aleppo province, despite US-led efforts to establish a truce in the Manbij area.
The fighting has continued since, with mounting casualties.
During a visit to Damascus on Friday, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said security of the Kurds is "essential for a peaceful Syria." She said this requires "an end to the fighting in the north and the integration of the Kurdish forces... in the Syrian security architecture."
The SDF controls vast areas of Syria's northeast, and parts of Deir Ezzor province in the east, where the Kurds created a semi-autonomous administration following the withdrawal of government forces during the civil war that began in 2011.
The group, which receives US backing, took control of additional territory after capturing it from the ISIS group.
Ankara accuses the main component of the SDF, the People's Protection Units (YPG), of affiliation with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has fought a decades-long insurgency in southeastern Türkiye and is banned as a terrorist organization by the government.
The Turkish military regularly launches strikes against Kurdish fighters in Syria and neighboring Iraq, accusing them of being PKK-linked.
Ahmed al-Sharaa, Syria's new leader and the head of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group, told Al Arabiya TV in late December that local Kurdish-led forces should be integrated into the national army.
HTS led the coalition of opposition groups that overthrew Assad last month.