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Subscribe to RSSTRIPOLI - Tripoli's airport closed Saturday night after armed men in the vehicles of Libya's new national army tried to take control of of the installation from a powerful militia, according to reports.
It was the latest in a series of clashes between the rival militias which, in the absence of a fully-functioning central government, have wielded real power on the streets in Libya since a revolt forced out former leader Moammar Gadhafi.
Mukhtar Al-Akhdar, commander of the airport's security force and head of a militia unit from Zintan, south-west of Tripoli, which controls the international airport, told Reuters on Sunday that a convoy of vehicles approached a checkpoint about 3 km (2 miles) from the airport.
He said the armed men in the convoy said they had come to take over security, and a gunfight then broke out.
"No one was killed. We have only two people injured on our side," Al-Akhdar told Reuters. "These people were using national army vehicles. When we asked (acting army chief of staff Khalifa) Haftar about it, he said he did not know these people."
NTC military spokesman Ahmed Bani did not comment on the details of the incident but said: "There is no political or other problem. The problem is now sorted out."
Hours earlier, Libya's president, Mustafa Abdul Jalil, begged for all sides to work for reconciliation, The Guardian reported.
Also Sunday, a team of U.S. weapons experts disposed of some 1,300 pounds (600 kilograms) of ordnance deep in the sand just outside Tripoli.
"Our goal is to help the Libyan people to secure these loose arms," said U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, Andrew Shapiro, who was on hand to watch along with the U.S. ambassador.
There have also been concerns following Libya's eight-month civil war about the massive amount of weapons and munitions that have gone missing, many of them taken from arms depots scattered about the country.
Shapiro said that since September, American experts have disabled around 5,000 shoulder-fired missile launchers — weapons that Western and Libyan officials have expressed concerns about because they pose a threat to civil aviation.
Separately, the head of the Libyan national army was ambushed at a checkpoint in the capital, the newspaper reported. The general's jeep escaped and two militiamen were later arrested, the Guardian quoted a spokesman as saying.
Power vacuum
Libya's central government is becoming slowly more assertive and signaling that it is time for the militias -- which emerged from the seven-month war to end Gaddafi's rule -- to hand over to the new national police and army.
Tripoli city council has given militias from other towns until December 20 to return home. The council chief said if they do not meet the deadline, all roads in the city will be blocked, except to defense and interior ministry vehicles.
Most militia leaders say publicly that they are ready to hand over to central institutions as soon as they receive the order to do so from the NTC.
But the national police and army are only just beginning to function. Some of the militias believe if they withdraw, that will leave a vacuum that will be filled by rival militias, in particular the powerful Islamists.
Tripoli international airport has already been a flashpoint for tensions. Late last month, armed men from Zintan briefly detained Abdel Hakim Belhadj, the Islamist leader of one of Tripoli's most powerful militias, as he tried to catch a flight.
Reuters and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Leave a Comment:
Thunder storms always follow the light rains of spring...
Well I hope somebody gives Obama a fiddle...we have supported and proped up these kings, dictators, tyrants for hundreds of years for a reason...I just hope the next President (if there is one) doesn't need OJT
*Caresses your profile picture*
PheaNiques ...
President Obama deserves huge credit for managing what might have been another Iraq into a situation as good as it is. Rather than a massive crisis killing thousands of Americans (Iraq, Afghanistan), Libya is slowly righting itself and shows every prospect of turning into an actual democracy. President Obama is showing wisdom and judgment, not the emotional reaction of the past. Success slowly emerging from chaos is the result.
Seriously, how did that whole Saddam thing work for you guys? And that whole Shah thing, too? How about that Afghan mujahideen one?
Excuse me, Toasty, but I really am completely confused about what you're trying to say.
No doubt (see my comment below) the countries in the middle east are engaged in a serial fluster cluck. That is hardly worth commenting about. What is worth commenting about: What can we do to make things (better/worse)?
Any comments that might contribute to "better" rather than "worse" ... or are you just having your own personal tea party there?
I think rockwell is very appropriate
The Administration has painted a very pretty picture...Egypt, Tunisia, Lybia, Pakistan, Yemen, and several more before all is said and done, will all land somewhere between Somalia and Iran...and likely the worst of each...you can give credit for that to whom ever you choose
So ... Phea, old chap ... What do you think we should do?
(Or are you just into the rock-throwing side of things?)
(And, speaking of Presidential experience, I think George Bush the Lesser had only been out of the country once when Karl and the Knuckledraggers (Hey! That could be a great name for a punk rock band!) put him into office. Certainly, he passed up a great opportunity to see beautiful South East Asia in favor of being a politician in Alabama when he was young.
So...Port, old chap
We should support stability everywhere in the world, and especially where that comes in the form of a new Democracy...This Arab Spring is neither Stable or Democratic...there is a reason that lambs are not trained to become Lion tamers...and just because you pointed it out, I get no better laugh than when a "kool-aid" drinker use "W" as the example of why "O" should be praised...because we all know how much you loved "W"...
"It was the latest in a series of clashes between the rival militias which, in the absence of a fully-functioning central government, have wielded real power on the streets in Libya... Separately, the head of the Libyan national army was ambushed at a checkpoint in the capital,"
Funny how the daily battles and attacks almost never make it into U.S. news isn't it? I suppose that would diminish the "mission accomplished... everything is fixed" story line.
P.S.
I wonder how that "trial" of Gadhafi's executioners is going. (sarcasm)
Ummm ... the civil war is over.
"NTC military spokesman Ahmed Bani did not comment on the details of the incident but said: "There is no political or other problem. The problem is now sorted out."
There are no daily battles and attacks. There is a process of figuring out how to run a country being carried out by people who haven't had any experience doing it for over a generation.
You really, really do want this to look bad, don't you. Sorry, but it's actually working itself out.
Phea ... so glad that we're getting so well acquainted!
You wrote, "We should support stability everywhere in the world ..."
Perhaps another way of phrasing that would be, "We should be the world's policeman!" 55,000 Americans who died in VietNam might have another point of view on that. More than anything else, President Obama should be commended for not overreacting in Libya. I think the phrase, "measured response" sums it up nicely.
And I don't really have a problem with people named "Bush". We had a President named Bush once who did a pretty commendable job. Too bad he also polluted the world with idiot, reactionary kids.
Yes, and there are not 6 million Jews, and hundreds of millions of others who would probably argue that the "World" needs a policeman...It doesn't need to be us, true...But a strong, sometimes forceful Nation willing to stand, when it is time to stand, anywhere in the world, not waiting for the world public opinion to force action...with leaders who understand the world we live in, is a must...Quaddafi was not everything that I would have liked to see as the Leader of Libya, but what will become of Libya without him (or some other governance), I would have prefered Support, while encouraging reform, instead we bomb the @!$%# out of the Lybian people for three months, so some WarLords can run the Country...In the last 3+ years we have been throwing our stable allies Leaders under the "proverbial" bus, knowing that the forces aligned against them are not our allies, friends...
Porter, my comment was directed at Phea. He made a post basically justifying backing dictators as if it were better than the alternative, yet the majority of wars in that region have been a result of our support of just those sort of tyrants.
tyrants and brutal dictators???
Not before MSM and this Administration decided that they were, Obama himself was shaking hands with Qaddafi a few short months before he was declared a brutal dictator, and Mubarak as well...
My point was and is, Pakistan was better off with Musharraf than they are without him, Egypt with Mubarak, Libya with Qaddafi was beginning to be accepted into the mainstream of nations, Yemen, soon Saudi and Bahrain and Iraq and Afghanistan are being gutted and tossed to Islamic Extremists for some Bong Dream Progressive Idea...watch out Britain we coming for the QUEEN next...
I have hopes for all of the Arab World to live in peace, with freedom and democracy, with properity and tolerance...but that is not what they are getting...and closing your eyes, clicking your heels, and wishing will not make it so
Shaking hands? Phea, which bodily orifice did you pull that out of?
@toasty
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/44/2009/07/09/obama_shakes_hands_with_gaddaf.html
A world leader meeting with other leaders at the G8 summit? EVERYBODY @!$%#ING PANIC!
Next you're going to tell me he let Gadhaffi visit New York to address the United Nations...
Sounds like someone needs to make up their minds...either they are brutal dictators, or they are world leaders just like the rest...
After all, Libyans follow the religion of "love and peace." So these clashes are common!
Let the buggers tear at one another...its a cultural imperative.
Imagine that!!!! Who would have thunk?
I don't know enough to make a comment, so I won't. I keep remembering George Washington and his warning us against foreign entanglements. Are we dumbing down?
George made those comments before the British marched up and down the east coast and burned the White House in the War of 1812.
"No man is an island, entire of itself."
It may just be that for once the USA played it right when it comes to factions saying they are fighting for freedom an wanting our support. The road to democracy is not an easy trek and even for the US it was fully of pitfall. We did not get involved with ground troops and that is a coarse we should continue to maintain in as far as Libya's journey to democracy goes. In the end the best and most lasting form of government for them will be the one they choose.
Absolutely! Remember the chaos that engulfed the old USSR after their internal revolution. Things got pretty bad in Russia. And they're still not good. But the weekend's events show that an actual democracy might be emerging there too. The main thing we had to do was to allow the process to proceed without doing something stupid. ("Something stupid" == "Bushism")
Here's another "something stupid" to chew on.
More than anything else, the mess is Iran right now is something WE created. - And by "WE" I mean the western world led by a United States that had more power than was good for us right after WWII. And we did it by being short term stupid.
Here's the first sentence from the Wikipedia article about Mosaddegh.
Mohammad Mosaddegh was the democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran from 1951 to 1953 when he was overthrown in a coup d'état orchestrated by the British MI5 and the United States Central Intelligence Agency.
These facts are not in doubt. We did it. It was exactly the kind of thing that knuckledragging tea partiers think we should do now. ("Yah!!! Bomb 'em back to the stone age!) The end result of that was that the Islamists eventually got control (because their country was being run by a puppet dictator installed by the West) and things became much, much worse.
President Obama is managing events in a more sane and thoughtful manner than we have had the benefit of for many decades.
Porter Rockwell,
A country is never any better than the people in charge of its direction; as this country has never been under the charge of god, or any other kind of benevolent Deity, it has never been perfect or ever will be perfect. That does not mean that we do not have the best form of government or that it can not be improved upon. The fact that the Bushes were once our presidents means nothing more nor nothing less to me than the fact that Obama is now our president.
The Republican party threw this country's economy under the bus and no amount of candy coating (read spin) is going to make me believe other wise; after all it's history I have lived through. On the other hand the Democratic party has done nothing to get things turned around; if anything they have made it worse.
But yes, you're right Obama has done a far better job in managing our international affairs than any president since Lincoln. As the Republican party has nothing but hinder any attempts at turning the economy around; and has provided no concrete plan of their own by which to turn things around... Then we as a people are better off keeping the status quo.
Think about it as long as congress remains in grid lock, they are not going to make things worse. If we don't have to worry about getting mired in stupid ground wars; yet continue to bring justice to those that deliberately put our security at risk... Then we as a people can grab the reigns to our economy and turn things back around again.
I actually couldn't find anything to disagree with in your message!
But I can add this much ...
One of the Bush presidents really wasn't that bad. Bush senior was a genuine war hero and kept us out of a quagmire in Iraq while, at the same time, getting other countries to pay for what we did do. (Until his idiot son came along.)
So ... I'm not a diehard leftist or Democrat. I really do admire some of the things that some Republicans do. (Present slate of idiots running excluded.)
My first reaction was to post a rant. Not worth the cost in blood pressure meds. Take a long look at Arabic culture. There has been fighting between sects for thousands of years. We cannot impose our ideology on these folks. None of the factions want our ideology, only our money and arms to help them advance their ideology. Let's leave them alone (all of them, all over the Mideast). Don't we have things at home to worry about? Oh wait, do we really want our politicians concentrating on our domestic issues and possibly messing us up as bad as they mess up our foreign policy issues?
Now, that felt much better than a rant.
Hillary and half&half must be so proud.
Yes, and I'm proud of them too. (And feeling pretty good about America for electing them.)
Proamerica, your label is apparently as pathetic as you are. Anyone who is really proamerican would not disrespect the President of the United States in that manner. What a total worthless american you turned out to be. Why don't you grow up and learn some damn manners you low life Bastardo.
at first the msm mentioned obama all the time when covering lybia. the week gadaffi was murdered the msm was praising obama not nato. that was the last time obama was mentioned in association with lybia since they declared sharia law and internal fighting started. WHERE IS THE DEMOCRACYAND FREEDOM OBAMA AND THAT WASTE OF TIME HILLERY HAVE BEEN SPEWING. teel me one muslum country that is a true democracy and i'll take fifty lashes. lock and load infidels
A - They have not declared sharia law.
B - Your facts about "msm" (Do you mean, "MSN"?) are completely wrong.
C - Indonesia, Turkey (Member of NATO, yet!), Bangladesh (Wikipedia: "Bangladesh is a parliamentary democracy, with an elected parliament.") -- Strip off your shirt or the whip will ruin it.
What a Bone head. Talk out of your a$$ much, do you?
"It was the latest in a series of clashes between the rival militias which, in the absence of a fully-functioning central government, have wielded real power on the streets in Libya... Separately, the head of the Libyan national army was ambushed at a checkpoint in the capital,"
Porter - Show us the MSN articles on all of the other clashes and attacks.
Not only do they make sure to not mention Obama with Libya... they prefer to not even acknowledge that Libya exists now.
President Obama (to his great credit) is not meddling in Libya now. That's why he's not part of the MSN news articles on Libya. (Geeze ... youse guys are so dense. Gotta explain everything to you!)
But Libya itself is still coming around and making progress ... again, much to the credit of President Obama and the other European leaders. News reporting overall is diminished because there's usually not that much happening there that is news these days. (Again, can't you figure these things out for yourself!)
It appears that you're desperately trying to make this look like something it is not.
What it is: A world crisis that was avoided by solid, thoughtful leadership ... for once.
What it is not: Some kind of conspiracy to cover up something.
Get a grip!
This is quite a surprise! I thought that NATO already had a stranglehold on Libya through the use of these so-called, self-styled "liberators". It would be kind of funny if Libya now fell into the hads of Muslim extremists!
NRA rules the world.
Muslims killing muslims; it doesn't get any beter than that!