0
Sunday 12 January 2020 - 10:07

Libyan National Army Accuses Haftar's Forces of Ceasefire Violations

Story Code : 838013
Libyan National Army Accuses Haftar
Libya's Government of National Accord has accused the Libyan Armed Forces of almost immediately violating the ceasefires in the Salah ad-Din and Wadi ar-Rabiya districts of Tripoli.

Earlier, the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA) under Fayez Sarraj announced on Sunday that it had joined the ceasefire in western Libya on the heels of the rival Libyan National Army (LNA).

"The presidential council's head [GNA] and commander-in-chief of the Libyan army [Fayez Sarraj] declares ceasefire that began at midnight of January 12," the GNA said in a statement on Facebook.

With that, the GNA stressed reserving "its lawful right to respond to any attack or aggression from the other side."

The situation in Libya has escalated over the past several weeks as LNA commander Khalifa Haftar ordered his troops to advance on the Libyan capital of Tripoli, controlled by the UN-recognized GNA. The city has already experienced being a battleground of a similar attack in April when hundreds of people were left killed and thousands more injured.

After the ouster and assassination of then-Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, the country was plunged into a brutal civil war. Today, Libya is divided between two centers of power: an elected parliament in the country's east, and the UN-backed GNA in the west.
Comment